Lodesman

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A pilot; navigator. historical

    "River and harbor pilotage, in English maritime affairs, is called loadmanage, from loadsman or lodesman, a kind of pilot established for the safe conduct of ships and vessels in and out of harbors, or up and down navigable rivers."

Example

More examples

"River and harbor pilotage, in English maritime affairs, is called loadmanage, from loadsman or lodesman, a kind of pilot established for the safe conduct of ships and vessels in and out of harbors, or up and down navigable rivers."

Etymology

From Middle English lodesman, lodesmon, lodysman (“pilot”, literally “lode's or course's man”), alteration of earlier lodeman, from Old English lādmann (“a leader, guide”), equivalent to lode (“way, course”) + -s- + man. Compare to lodemanage.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.