Dictionary

headsman en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (US) audio

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”).

Meanings

1. (Scotland, obsolete) A chief person; a head man
2. 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. 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 40, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book I, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:
   • And made him Headsman, for we said, / "Who's next to be decapited / Cannot cut off another's head / Until he's cut his own off[…]" 1885, W[illiam] S[chwenck] Gilbert; Arthur Sullivan, composer, […] The Mikado; or, The Town of Titipu, London: Chappel & Co., […], →OCLC:
3. (historical) 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.
4. One in command of a whaling vessel.

Forms

Synonyms

beheader (one who executes via decapitation) · decapitator (one who executes via decapitation)

Translations (8)

it carnefice (An executioner) · sv skarprättare (An executioner) · bg палач (An executioner) · de Scharfrichter (An executioner) · el αποκεφαλιστής (An executioner) · tl mamumugot (An executioner) · mk главосек (An executioner) · ar جَلَّاد (An executioner)