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skipper

nounverbnounnounverbnouncommon in dialogue

  • Canada//ˈskɪp.ɚ//
  • Australia//ˈskɪp.ə//
  • Australia/[ˈskɪp.ə]/
  • New Zealand//ˈskɘp.ɘ//
  • New Zealand/[ˈskɘp.ɘ]/

The master of a ship.

noun

  1. 1

    The master of a ship.

    The skipper Mr. Cooke had hired at Far Harbor was a God-fearing man with a luke warm interest in his new billet and employer, and had only been prevailed upon to take charge of the yacht after the offer of an emolument equal to half a year's sea pay of an ensign in the navy.

    It is standard practice for search and rescue authorities to ask other vessels in the area to assist. Usually, this is done. The weather on the night of 31 December was too atrocious, and when at 11pm the Coast Guard asked the crabber Ruff & Reddy to head to the scene, its skipper refused, as a skipper has a right to do if he believes conditions to be too treacherous.

  2. 2

    A coach, director, or other leader.

  3. 3

    The captain of a sports team such as football, cricket, rugby or curling.

    But even the return of skipper Steven Gerrard from a six-week injury layoff could not inspire Liverpool

  4. 4

    informalSynonym of detective sergeant, especially as a term of direct address.

Etymology

From Middle English skippere, skyppere, scippere, borrowed from Middle Dutch scipper, schipper, from Old Dutch *skipāri, from Proto-Germanic *skipārijaz. Piecewise doublet of shipper, from ship + -er.

verb

  1. 1

    To captain a ship or a sports team.

    Tourist subs, which could once be skippered by anyone with a U.S. Coast Guard captain’s license

noun

  1. 1

    A person who skips, or fails to attend class.

  2. 2

    One who jumps rope.

  3. 3

    Any of various butterflies of the families Hesperiidae and its subfamily Megathyminae, having a hairy mothlike body, hooked tips on the antennae, and a darting flight pattern.

    Blue skippers in sunny hours ope and shut Where wormwood and grunsel flowers by the cart ruts […]

  4. 4

    Any of several marine fishes that often leap above water, especially Cololabis saira (Pacific saury) and Sprattus sprattus (European sprat).

  5. 5

    obsoleteA young, thoughtless person.

    Skipper, stand back; 'tis age that nourisheth

  6. 6

    The cheese maggot, the larva of a cheese fly (family Piophilidae), which leaps to escape predators.

  7. 7

    Also a form of skipAgent noun of skip: one who skips.

Etymology

From Middle English skippere, skyppare, equivalent to skip + -er.

noun

  1. 1

    A barn or shed in which to shelter for the night.

Etymology

Probably from Welsh ysgubor (“a barn”).

verb

  1. 1

    To take shelter in a barn or shed.

noun

  1. 1

    A short-sleeved (or long-sleeved) tee-shirt, or sweatshirt.

    Plain nylon doeks...Men's knitted skippers, long sleeves, three buttons in front.

    The special constables..were issued with one pair of boots, two overalls, one raincoat, and two skippers — but no shirts or warm coats.

    My neighbour's little boy pestered his dad for a 'Viva' T-shirt. This long-suffering man pointed out to his son that he had been sharing his w:Cosatu skipper with him.., but the kid..did not want to wear it any longer as it was not, as he put it, 'skipa sa Mandela'.

Etymology

Unknown, perhaps related to jumper.

Forms

plural
skippers
past tense
skippered
past participle
skippered
present participle
skippering
third person singular
skippers
The neighbouring pagesAlphabetical order follows the rules of the language, not byte values: an accent decides only between two otherwise identical words, and Spanish files Ñ as a letter of its own.

Lexical content from Wiktionary, under CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source entry · Data version 2026-08-23

Rank among the words of the OpenSubtitles 2018 corpus — film and television subtitles, so spoken rather than written usage (CC BY-SA 3.0).