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soldier - 5 dictionary results
sol⋅dier
[sohl-jer] 
dʒər
–noun
| 1. | a person who serves in an army; a person engaged in military service. |
| 2. | an enlisted man or woman, as distinguished from a commissioned officer: the soldiers' mess and the officers' mess. |
| 3. | a person of military skill or experience: George Washington was a great soldier. |
| 4. | a person who contends or serves in any cause: a soldier of the Lord. |
| 5. | Also called button man. Slang. a low-ranking member of a crime organization or syndicate. |
| 6. | Entomology. a member of a caste of sexually underdeveloped female ants or termites specialized, as with powerful jaws, to defend the colony from invaders. |
| 7. | a brick laid vertically with the narrower long face out. Compare rowlock (def. 2). |
| 8. | Informal. a person who avoids work or pretends to work; loafer; malingerer. |
–verb (used without object)
—Verb phrase| 9. | to act or serve as a soldier. |
| 10. | Informal. to loaf while pretending to work; malinger: He was soldiering on the job. |
| 11. | soldier on, to persist steadfastly in one's work; persevere: to soldier on until the work is done. |
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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|
Link To soldier
| sol·dier (sōl'jər) n.
[Middle English soudier, mercenary, from Anglo-Norman soudeour, soldeier and Old French soudoior, soudier, both from Old French sol, soud, sou, from Late Latin solidum, soldum, pay, from solidus, solidus; see solidus.] sol'dier·ship' n. Word History: Why do soldiers fight? One answer is hidden in the word soldier itself. Its first recorded occurrence is found in a work composed around 1300, the word having come into Middle English (as soudier) from Old French soudoior and Anglo-Norman soudeour. The Old French word, first recorded in the 12th century, is derived from sol or soud, Old French forms of Modern French sou. There is no longer a French coin named sou, but the meaning of sou alerts us to the fact that money is involved. Indeed, Old French sol referred to a coin and also meant "pay," and a soudoior was a man who fought for pay. This was a concept worth expressing in an era when many men were not paid for fighting but did it in service to a feudal superior. Thus soldier is parallel to the word mercenary, which goes back to Latin mercēnnārius, derived from mercēs, "pay," and meaning "working for pay." The word could also be used as a noun, one of whose senses was "a soldier of fortune." |
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Soldier
Sol"dier\, n. [OE. souldier, soudiour, souder, OF. soldier, soldoier, soldeier, sodoier, soudoier, soudier, fr. L. solidus a piece of money (hence applied to the pay of a soldier), fr. solidus solid. See Solid, and cf. Sold, n.]1. One who is engaged in military service as an officer or a private; one who serves in an army; one of an organized body of combatants. I am a soldier and unapt to weep. --Shak. 2. Especially, a private in military service, as distinguished from an officer. It were meet that any one, before he came to be a captain, should have been a soldier. --Spenser. 3. A brave warrior; a man of military experience and skill, or a man of distinguished valor; -- used by way of emphasis or distinction. --Shak. 4. (Zo["o]l.) The red or cuckoo gurnard (Trigla pini.) [Prov. Eng.] 5. (Zo["o]l.) One of the asexual polymorphic forms of white ants, or termites, in which the head and jaws are very large and strong. The soldiers serve to defend the nest. See Termite. Soldier beetle (Zo["o]l.), an American carabid beetle (Chauliognathus Americanus) whose larva feeds upon other insects, such as the plum curculio. Soldier bug (Zo["o]l.), any hemipterous insect of the genus Podisus and allied genera, as the spined soldier bug (Podius spinosus). These bugs suck the blood of other insects. Soldier crab (Zo["o]l.) (a) The hermit crab. (b) The fiddler crab. Soldier fish (Zo["o]l.), a bright-colored etheostomoid fish (Etheostoma c[oe]ruleum) found in the Mississippi River; -- called also blue darter, and rainbow darter. Soldier fly (Zo["o]l.), any one of numerous species of small dipterous flies of the genus Stratyomys and allied genera. They are often bright green, with a metallic luster, and are ornamented on the sides of the back with markings of yellow, like epaulets or shoulder straps. Soldier moth (Zo["o]l.), a large geometrid moth (Euschema militaris), having the wings bright yellow with bluish black lines and spots. Soldier orchis (Bot.), a kind of orchis (Orchis militaris).Soldier
Sol"dier\, v. i. 1. To serve as a soldier. 2. To make a pretense of doing something, or of performing any task. [Colloq.U.S.] Note: In this sense the vulgar pronounciation (s[=o]"j[~e]r) is jocosely preserved. It needs an opera glass to discover whether the leaders are pulling, or only soldiering. --C. D. Warner.
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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Language Translation for : soldier
Spanish:
soldado,
German:
der Soldat,
Japanese:
軍人
soldier (n.)
c.1300, from O.Fr. soudier "one who serves in the army for pay," from M.L. soldarius "a soldier" (cf. It. soldato and Fr. soldat "soldier," which is borrowed from It.), lit. "one having pay," from L.L. soldum, from acc. of L. solidus, a Roman gold coin (see solidus). The verb meaning "to serve as a soldier" is first recorded 1647; to soldier on "persist doggedly" is attested from 1954.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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