Harpooneer
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A harpooner, one who uses a harpoon to hunt whales.
"To all this I joyously assented; for besides the affection I now felt for Queequeg, he was an experienced harpooneer, and as such, could not fail to be of great usefulness to one, who, like me, was wholly ignorant of the mysteries of whaling, though well acquainted with the sea, as known to merchant seamen."
- 2 someone who launches harpoons wordnet
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"To all this I joyously assented; for besides the affection I now felt for Queequeg, he was an experienced harpooneer, and as such, could not fail to be of great usefulness to one, who, like me, was wholly ignorant of the mysteries of whaling, though well acquainted with the sea, as known to merchant seamen."
Etymology
From harpoon + -eer.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.