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Headsman

noun

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A chief person; a head man Scotland, obsolete
  2. 2
    a male executioner who beheads the condemned person wordnet
  3. 3
    An executioner whose method of dispatching the condemned is decapitation.

    "And of those base-minded jesters or buffons, some have beene seene, that even at the point of death would never leave their jesting and scoffing. He whom the heads-man threw off from the Gallowes cried out, ‘Row the Gally,’ which was his ordinarie by-word."

  4. 4
    A labourer in a colliery who transports the coal from the workings to the horseway, and who is oftentimes assisted by a younger worker called a foal. historical
  5. 5
    One in command of a whaling vessel.

Etymology

From Middle English heddysman, equivalent to head + -s- + -man. Cognate with Scots hedisman, heidisman (“head man; chief; commander”). Compare also Danish høvedsmand (“captain”), Swedish hövitsman (“captain”), Icelandic höfuðsmaður (“captain”), German Hauptmann (“captain”).

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