Word Origin Atlas

Exact historical dictionary sense

Commander in Webster's 1913 dictionary

The 1913 record labels commander as noun. Its source-bounded etymology and selected historical definition appear below.

WEBSTER 1913noun
Commander

[Cf. F. commandeur. Cf. Commodore, Commender.]

Cross-verified historical sense
The source text may be outdated. The page preserves that historical boundary.
Cross-verified 1913 record
Headwordcommander
Part of speechnoun
Historical etymology[Cf. F. commandeur. Cf. Commodore, Commender.]
Selected historical definitionA chief; one who has supreme authority; a leader; the chief officer of an army, or of any division of it.
Signed record IDwebster1913-commander-noun-6de0c4406a20
Source locatorCIDE.C, paragraph 11933; Gutenberg eBook 661
Edition-scoped answerNot earliest-attestation proofNot modern consensus
Independent historical textProject Gutenberg section 661Signed structural record sourceGNU GCIDE 0.54 archive
Quick answer

In Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913), "commander" is labeled noun. Its etymology is recorded as: "[Cf. F. commandeur. Cf. Commodore, Commender.]" The selected historical definition says: "A chief; one who has supreme authority; a leader; the chief officer of an army, or of any division of it."

Project Gutenberg Webster 1913 plus signed GNU GCIDE 0.54 Exact cross-verified historical record reviewed 2026-10-04

What this answer proves

One named sense in one historical dictionary edition.

The answer reports the selected headword, part of speech, etymology, definition, and source locator as transcribed in the cross-verified 1913 record.

Evidence boundaryIt does not establish the earliest attestation or a complete borrowing chain.It does not claim current scholarly consensus or a modern dictionary definition.Historical dictionary text may be obsolete, incomplete, inaccurate, or offensive by modern standards.

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