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martinet

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈmæɹtɪnɛt/, /mæɹtˈnɛt/, /mɑɹtɪˈnɛt/
  • Audio (Southern England):(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɛt

Etymology 1

After the example of 17th-century French army officer Jean Martinet.

Noun

martinet (plural martinets)

  1. (military) A strict disciplinarian.
    • 1910, Emerson Hough, chapter I, in The Purchase Price: Or The Cause of Compromise, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
      Captain Edward Carlisle, soldier as he was, martinet as he was, felt a curious sensation of helplessness seize upon him as he met her steady gaze, her alluring smile ; he could not tell what this prisoner might do.
    • 1996, David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest […], Boston, Mass., New York, N.Y.: Little, Brown and Company, →ISBN, page 15:
      The same Aubrey deLint I'd dismissed for years as a 2-D martinet knelt gurneyside to squeeze my restrained hand and say ‘Just hang in there, Buckaroo,’ […]
    • 2008, Greil Marcus, “Tied to History”, in The Threepenny Review‎:
      In Seattle, he was replaced by a martinet from Annapolis, a man so vain and incompetent, so impatient with advice from experienced sailors and sure of his own right way, that, when the Hull set sail for the South Pacific, twenty men went AWOL, certain that to ship with this man was a death sentence.
  2. (figuratively) Anyone who lays stress on a rigid adherence to the details of discipline, or to forms and fixed methods or rules.
    • 1942 July-August, Chas. S. Lake, “Some C.M.Es. I Have Known: II—C. J. Bowen Cooke”, in Railway Magazine, page 223:
      Before I met Mr. Bowen Cooke I had been given to understand that he was of a reserved nature, and on occasion could be a "bit of a martinet"; [...].
  3. (historical) A short whip with multiple lashes once used in France.

Etymology 2

Borrowed from French martinet.

Noun

martinet (plural martinets)

  1. A martin; a swift.

Anagrams

Catalan

Etymology

From Martí +‎ -et.

Pronunciation

Noun

martinet m (plural martinets)

  1. heron (a wading bird of the family Ardeidae)

Derived terms

Further reading

French

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

From marteau (“hammer”).

Noun

martinet m (plural martinets)

  1. multi-tail whip, comprising leather or whipcord thongs fixed on a handle, to dust off or to administer a beating
  2. mechanical hammer on a motor-driven cogwheel, as used to beat metal

Etymology 2

From Martin +‎ -et.

Noun

martinet m (plural martinets)

  1. martin (any of the swallow-like birds, black with a white throat, of family Hirundinidae)
  2. swift (bird)

Further reading

Anagrams

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