seaman

C2+ Topic:People & Society

US /ˈsimən/ UK /ˈsiːmən/ See IPA manual

Homophones

semen /ˈsimən/

Meanings

1

noun
a sailor or person who works aboard a ship

The young seaman scrubbed the deck before dawn.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 noun · a sailor or person who... sailor mariner seafarer deckhand tar

Opposites

landlubber

Word family

Derived forms seamanshipseamanlike

Related forms seafarer seafaring

Appears in

Phrases (1)

See all

able seaman
a trained sailor qualified to carry out skilled work on a merchant ship

Adjective + noun

Etymology

From Old English 'sǣmann', a compound of 'sǣ' ('sea') + 'mann' ('man, person').

sǣ Old English mann Old English

View etymology graph ->

Topics

People & Society Maritime & Sailing Word Formation & Derivatives

External links

# seaman

**Type:** Word
**Level:** C2+
**Part of speech:** noun
**IPA (US):** /ˈsimən/
**IPA (UK):** /ˈsiːmən/

## Meanings
1. a sailor or person who works aboard a ship

## Examples
- The young seaman scrubbed the deck before dawn.

## Synonyms
- sailor
- mariner
- seafarer
- deckhand
- tar

## Antonyms
- landlubber

## Derived Forms
- seamanship
- seamanlike

## Related Forms
- seafarer
- seafaring

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: sǣ
- Root: mann

## Etymology
From Old English 'sǣmann', a compound of 'sǣ' ('sea') + 'mann' ('man, person').

## AI Etymology
Seaman comes from Old English 'sǣmann', a compound of 'sǣ' ('sea') + 'mann' ('man, person'). The historical chain includes Old English sǣ and Old English mann. The quoted older senses, "sǣmann", "sǣ", "sea", "mann", and "man, person", supply the semantic anchors for seaman. The formation is best read as compound and borrowed: the word seaman carries its older form-history into a compact English lexical shape. In present English it is used as a noun, "a sailor or person who works aboard a ship". English derivatives include seamanship and seamanlike; related English forms include seafarer and seafaring. The result is a noun whose etymology preserves both the older form and the later English specialization.

## Topics
- People & Society
- Maritime & Sailing
- Word Formation & Derivatives

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