different between captain vs ringer

English

Etymology

From Middle English capitain, capteyn, from Old French capitaine, from Late Latin capit?neus, from Latin caput (“head”) (English cap). Doublet of chieftain, also from Old French.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?kæp.t?n/, /-t?n/
• (US, General Australian) IPA^(key): /?kæp.t?n/
• (naval, informal) IPA^(key): /?kæp.?n/, [?kæpn?], [?kæpm?]

Noun

captain (plural captains)

1. A chief or leader.
   • 1526, The Bible, tr. William Tyndale, Matthew 2:

     For out of the shal come a captaine, whych shall govern my people israhel.

   • 1929, Rudyard Kipling, "The English Way":

     Stand up-stand up, Northumberland! / I bid you answer true, / If England's King has under his hand / A Captain as good as you?

2. The person lawfully in command of a ship or other vessel.

3. An army officer with a rank between the most senior grade of lieutenant and major.

   • "A fine man, that Dunwody, yonder," commented the young captain, as they parted, and as he turned to his prisoner. "We'll see him on in Washington some day. He is strengthening his forces now against Mr. Benton out there. […]."

4. A naval officer with a rank between commander and commodore.
5. A commissioned officer in the United States Navy, Coast Guard, NOAA Corps, or PHS Corps of a grade superior to a commander and junior to a rear admiral (lower half). A captain is equal in grade or rank to an Army, Marine Corps, or Air Force colonel.
7. One of the athletes on a sports team who is designated to make decisions, and is allowed to speak for his team with a referee or official.
   • 2000, Gregory Allen Howard, Remember the Titans

     Captain's supposed to be the leader, right?
8. The leader of a group of workers.
9. The head boy of a school.
10. A maître d', a headwaiter.
    • 1977, Don Felder, Don Henley, and Glenn Frey, lyricists, "Hotel California",

      So I called up the Captain, "Please bring me my wine." / He said: "We haven't had that spirit here since 1969."

11. (Southern US) An honorific title given to a prominent person. See colonel.

Synonyms

• (leader of a group of workers): supervisor, straw boss, foreman
• (commander of a vessel): skipper, master
• (pilot in command): pilot, pilot in command
• (military rank): CAPT, CAPT., Capt., Capt, CPT (abbreviation)

Derived terms

Descendants

• Sranan Tongo: kapten
• ? Irish: captaen

Translations

Verb

captain (third-person singular simple present captains, present participle captaining, simple past and past participle captained)

1. (intransitive) To act as captain
2. (transitive) To exercise command of a ship, aircraft or sports team.

Related terms

Translations

Anagrams

• anti-cap, capitan, patican

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?????(?)/
• Rhymes: -???(?)

Etymology 1

From Middle English ringere, rynger, ryngar, equivalent to ring (“to sound a bell”) +? -er.

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. Someone who rings, especially a bell ringer.
   • 1863, Jean Ingelow, High Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire,

     Pull, if ye never pull?d before;

     Good ringers, pull your best," quoth he.

2. (mining) A crowbar.

References

Etymology 2

From ring (“to surround”) +? -er.

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. (games) In the game of horseshoes, the event of the horseshoe landing around the pole.
2. (uncountable, games) A game of marbles where players attempt to knock each other's marbles out of a ring drawn on the ground.
3. A ringer T-shirt.
   • 2007, Descant (issue 138, page 28)

     […] shabby baseball caps, faded and worn-out T-shirts, ringers and polos with artificially aged hems […]

   • 2011, Buck Peden, Baseball, Golf, Wars, Women & Puppies: An Autobiography (page 278)

     The shirts were light blue heather ringers with royal blue trim on the necks and sleeves.

See also

• ringer T-shirt

Etymology 3

Probably from ring the changes.

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. (sports) A person highly proficient at a skill or sport who is brought in, often fraudulently, to supplement a team.

   Synonym: hustler

2. (horse racing) A horse fraudulently entered in a race using the name of another horse.
3. A person, animal, or entity which resembles another so closely as to be taken for the other, now usually in the phrase dead ringer.

   Synonym: dead ringer
4. (Britain, slang) A fraudulently cloned motor vehicle.
   • 2020, Tom Hartley, Tom Hartley: The Dealmaker

     I had heard early on in my career about 'ringers': cars that were stolen and cloned, but it was 1993 before I was to experience this first-hand.

Etymology 4

Unknown. Probably so named after the custom of ringing a bell to denote the winner of a contest or competition.

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. (Britain, dialect) A top performer.
2. (Australia) The champion shearer of a shearing shed.
3. (Australia) A stockman, a cowboy.
   • 1964, Alec Bolton, Walkabout?s Australia, Walkabout magazine, page 107,

     The ringers are the stockmen on a station. The cattle pass through their hands before the drovers lift them and take them along the stock routes that lead to the killing pens in cities.

   • 1987, Geoffrey Atkinson, Philip Quirk. The Australian Adventure: The Explorer?s Guide to the Island Continent, page 175,

     This vast holding is run by six ringers and six boys. A ringer is a qualified stationhand and a boy is a trainee. It takes four years for a boy to become a ringer.

   • 2005, Jake Drake, The Wild West in Australia and America, page 156,

     Most people associated with the Australian beef industry believe the ringer?s skill of throwing cattle by the tail to be a practice that is purely Australian. There is ample evidence however, that it was practised in South and Central America long before it was developed here.

Etymology 5

Perhaps dissimilated from Middle English wringere (“stingy person, pennypincher, one who financially oppresses, an extortioner”).

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. (slang) Any person or thing that is fraudulent; a fake or impostor.

Etymology 6

ring +? -er, from the noun.

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. (Britain, military, informal, in combination) An officer having the specified number of rings (denoting rank) on the uniform sleeve.
   • 2012, John Harris, The Lonely Voyage

     A group of naval one- and two-ringers were chatting by the office door with a few ratings, complete with kit-bags and oilskins.

   • 2013, Dudley Pope, Convoy

     The senior officer of the escort was an RN two and a half ringer who had a reputation of being one of the best.

Anagrams

• Griner, erring, gerrin', girner

Danish

Verb

ringer

1. present of ringe

Norwegian Bokmål

Noun

ringer m

1. indefinite plural of ring

Verb

ringer

1. present of ringe

Norwegian Nynorsk

Verb

ringer

1. present tense of ringa and ringe

Old Swedish

Etymology

From Old Norse hringr, from Proto-Germanic *hringaz.

Noun

ringer m

1. ring, circle

Declension

Descendants

• Swedish: ring

Swedish

Verb

ringer

1. present tense of ringa.