stevedore
Meanings
Plural: stevedores
Noun
- a laborer who loads and unloads vessels in a port
- A dockworker involved in loading and unloading cargo, or in supervising such work.
Verb
- To load or unload a ship's cargo.
Origin / Etymology
From Spanish estibador (cognate with Portuguese estivador, and compare Medieval Latin stivator), from estivar, estibar (“to load”), from Medieval Latin stivare, stīpāre (compare Italian stivare, stipare), the present active infinitive of stīpō (“to cram, fill, stuff”), derived from Proto-Indo-European *steypos, which is from the root Proto-Indo-European *steyp-. It is cognate with stiff through Proto-Indo-European.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word was attested in 1788 in the early form stowadore (see the quotations). It was included in the 1st edition of Webster’s Dictionary (1828) as stevedore.
Synonyms
dock worker, dock-walloper, docker, dockhand, dockworker, loader, longshoreman, lumper, wharfie
Scrabble Score: 13
stevedore is a valid Scrabble (US) TWL wordstevedore is a valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
stevedore is a valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary