anchor

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“
A gust of wind canted her head away from the shores of the little bay, and in a few seconds her anchor was a-trip, and under her fore and main topsails and headsails only the Mahina wore round, and began to slip through the water As soon as the anchor was secured Rawlings came for'ard and stood beside his chief mate, watching the shore lights That'll do, Mr. Barry. We're all right now.

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Definitions (61)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (11)

  1. noun Nautical A heavy object attached to a vessel by a cable or rope and cast overboard to keep the vessel in place either by its weight or by its flukes, which grip the bottom.
  2. noun A rigid point of support, as for securing a rope.
  3. noun A source of security or stability.
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Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (41)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (4)

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Examples (50)

  • They had used the wind to good advantage before the sails, rigging, and sea anchor were all damaged, working hard, tacking hard, sailing into the wind, waves crashing over the bow, to get deeper into the central inland sea, obviously all worried about the kilometer-high cliffs behind them to the north, and covering hundreds of kilometers in the first two days of the storm. —  Dan Simmons - Hockenberry 1 - Ilium
  • Sebnem explains that the reason for the blackface, then, is that the anchor is asking Mr. Obama for a series of favors: "demanding Mr. Obama's support for Turkey's fight against Kurdish rebels, the country's bid to join the European Union and its rejection of Armenian claims that Turkey had committed genocide." —  The Lede
  • Speaking to an anchor from the Spanish-language Univision TV network, he said he would focus on targeting exploitative employers and promised to act on comprehensive immigration reform. —  Signs of the Times
  • On the extras side, the anchor is the highly enlightening —  digitallyOBSESSED.com DVD News and Reviews
  • The crew went tramping round the capstan to the sound of the merry fife, the anchor was away, and under a wide spread of snowy canvas the dashing "Blanche" of thirty-two guns, commanded by the gallant Captain Faulkner, stood through the Needle passage between the Isle of Wight and the main, on her way down channel, bound out to the West Indies. —  The Grateful Indian And other Stories
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Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

sail ·  mast ·  cable ·  boat ·  rope ·  rig ·  anchorage ·  pier ·  hook ·  port ·  cargo ·  crow

Used in the same contextWord Family

anchor:   anchors ·  anchoring ·  anchored
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (4)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English anker, ancher, from Old English ancor, from Latin ancora, anchora, from Greek ankura.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (3)

  1. The spelling has been changed to make it look like anchora, a corrupt modern spelling of Latin ancora; properly anker, in early modern English reg. anker, also anchor, ankor, ancour, etc., from Middle English reg. anker (also ankre, ancre, after Old French ancre), from Anglo-Saxon ancor, ancer, oncer = Dutch anker = Old High German anchar, Middle High German G. anker (later Polish ankier) = Icelandic akkeri = Swedish ankar = Danish anker = Old French and F. ancre = Spanish ancla, áncora = Portuguese ancora = Italian ancora, from Latin ancora (in modern spelling corruptly anchora, later English anchor, prob. by confusion with anker, later anchor, where the “restored” spelling has an actual Greek basis) = Old Bulgarian anŭkyura, anŭkira = Russian yakorĭ = Lithuanian inkoras = Lettish enkuris = Alban. ankure, from Greek ἂγκυρα, an anchor, a hook, connected with ἂγκος, a bend, ἀγκύλος, crooked, curved, Latin angulus, an angle, a corner: see angle, angle, ankle, ankylose, etc.
  2. Early modern English reg. anker, from Middle English ankren, ancren, from Anglo-Saxon *ancrian = Dutch ankeren = German ankern = Swedish ankra = Danish ankre; cf. French ancrer = Spanish anclar, ancorar = Portuguese ancorar = Italian ancorare, from Middle Latin ancorare; from the noun.
  3. The spelling has been changed to make it more like anchoret, and orig. *anchoreta (cf. anchor); properly anker, in early modern English reg. anker, from Middle English reg. anker, ankre, ancre, an anchoret or anchoress, monk or nun, from Anglo-Saxon ancra, also, rarely, ancer, ancor (in comp. ancer-, ancor-, once anacor-), masculine, an anchoret, also perhaps *ancre, feminine, an anchoress, = Old Saxon ēnkoro = Old High German cinchoro, anchoret, spelled as if from Old Saxon ēn = Old High German ein, one (cf. monk, ult. from Greek μόνος, one), but all corruptions of Middle Latin *anchoreta, anachorita, Late Latin anachoreta, whence the later English forms anchoret and anchorite, q. v.
 

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/ˈæŋkər/
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