English Online Dictionary. What means messenger? What does messenger mean?
English
Etymology
From Middle English messengere, messingere, messangere, from Old French messanger, a variant of Old French messagier (French messager), equivalent to message + -er. Doublet of messager. Displaced native Old English boda (“messenger, envoy”) and ǣrendraca (“messenger, ambassador”).
For the replacement of -ager with -enger, -inger, -anger, compare passenger, harbinger, scavenger, porringer. This development may have been merely the addition of n, or it may have resulted due to contamination from other suffixes such as Middle English -ing and the rare Old French -ange, -enc, -inge, -inghe (“-ing”) for Old French -age (“-age”).
Pronunciation
- (General American) IPA(key): /ˈmɛs.n̩.d͡ʒɚ/
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈmɛs.n̩.d͡ʒə/
- Hyphenation: mes‧sen‧ger
Noun
messenger (plural messengers)
- One who brings messages.
- The secretary bird.
- The supporting member of an aerial cable (electric power or telephone or data).
- (law) A person appointed to perform certain ministerial duties under bankrupt and insolvent laws, such as to take charge of the estate of the bankrupt or insolvent.
- (computing) An instant messenger program.
- (figurative) A forerunner or harbinger.
- A light scudding cloud preceding a storm.
- A piece of paper, etc., blown up a string to a kite.
- (nautical) A light line with which a heavier line may be hauled e.g. from the deck of a ship to the pier.
- (oceanography) A weight dropped down a line to close a Nansen bottle.
- (Scotland) A messenger-at-arms.
- (bowling) A pin which travels across the pin deck to knock over another pin, usually for a strike.
Derived terms
Translations
Verb
messenger (third-person singular simple present messengers, present participle messengering, simple past and past participle messengered)
- (transitive) To send something by messenger.
Scots
Alternative forms
- messinger
Etymology
From Old French messagier.
Noun
messenger (plural messengers)
- messenger
Derived terms
- corbie messenger
References
- “mesinger, n.”, in The Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries, 2004–present, →OCLC, retrieved 20 May 2024, reproduced from William A[lexander] Craigie, A[dam] J[ack] Aitken [et al.], editors, A Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue: […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1931–2002, →OCLC.
- “messenger, n.”, in The Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries, 2004–present, →OCLC, retrieved 20 May 2024, reproduced from W[illiam] Grant and D[avid] D. Murison, editors, The Scottish National Dictionary, Edinburgh: Scottish National Dictionary Association, 1931–1976, →OCLC.