Definition of "dan"

Dan Phoebus, he with many a low'ring look / Had her beheld in yore in angry wise.

1578, George Gascoigne, “A Moonshine Banquet”, in A Hundred Sundry Flowers

Old Dan Geoffrey, in whose gentle spright / The pure well-head of Poesy did dwell.

1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book VI, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie

This senior-junior, giant-dwarf, dan Cupid.

c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals)

The patriarchal age, / What time Dan Abraham left the Chaldee land.

1748, James Thomson, The Castle of Indolence: […], London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, […]

He did—and in a moment press'd / The place—in Paradise the best, / As by Dan Moses said.

1777, James Perry, The Electrical Eel; or, Gymnotus Electricus

Dan Chaucer, the first warbler, whose sweet breath / Preluded those melodious bursts, that fill / The spacious times of great Elizabeth / With sounds that echo still.

1842, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, A Dream of Fair Women

Dan Neptune says that "ere a twelvemonth pass, / The Senate shall to Ireland go to grass."

1846, Terence McMahon Hughes, The Biliad

Oh, me' name is Dan Homer, I'm blind, as the Jews, / And I travels around with my head full av news.

1962, A. D. Hope, The Ballad of Dan Homer

Carrying away of 25 great-lines, 3 dans, buoys, &c., of steam liner 'Star of the East' […]

1913, Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons, Parliamentary Papers: 1909-1982, page 165

Dumping dans. Dan buoys laid to mark a dumping ground. They are fitted with a topmark in the shape of a St. Andrews cross formed by battens 2 feet in length. Live dan. Dan buoy for which a […]

1917, United States. Office of Naval Intelligence, O.N.I. Publications, page 17