darn¹ / därn/ • v. [tr.] mend (knitted material or a hole in this) by weaving yarn across the hole with a needle: darn socks.darn² (also durn) • v. , adj. & interj. inf. euphemism for damn: [as v.] darn it all, Poppa | [as adj.] the darn things were expensive.

darn 2, darned, darnation. Earliest in darn adv. (late XVIII), used as an intensive, which Noah Webster identified with †dern (OE. d(i)erne) ‘concealed’, later ‘dark, drear, dim’, as in the phr. dern and dismal, which presumably became darn(ed) dismal; cf. var. durn. When darn(ed) had become a mild substitute for damn, darnation would readily follow. Cf. U.S. tarnation sb., adj., adv. (XVIII), which is prob. to be assoc. with the similarly used and somewhat earlier tarnal, aphetic form of etarnal, eternal.

darn 1 mend (clothes) with yarn or thread, XVI. poss. a use of darn, later form of †dern conceal, hide (OE. diernan); cf. MDu. dernen stop holes in (a dike).