breaker

Etymology

From Middle English brekere, equivalent to break +‎ -er. Cognate with Dutch breker, German Brecher.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈbɹeɪkə/
• (US) enPR: brāʹkər, IPA^(key): /ˈbɹeɪkɚ/
• Rhymes: -eɪkə(r)

Noun

breaker (plural breakers)

1. Something that breaks.
2. A machine for breaking rocks, or for breaking coal at the mines
3. The building in which such a machine is placed.
4. A small cask of liquid kept permanently in a ship's boat in case of shipwreck.
   • 1898, J. Meade Falkner, Moonfleet Chapter 4

     Then the conversation broke off, and there was little more talking, only a noise of men going backwards and forwards, and of putting down of kegs and the hollow gurgle of good liquor being poured from breakers into the casks.

5. A person who specializes in breaking things.
6. (chiefly in the plural) A wave breaking into foam against the shore, or against a sandbank, or a rock or reef near the surface, considered a useful warning to ships of an underwater hazard
   • 1919, W. Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence, chapter 53

     Now and then in the lagoon you hear the leaping of a fish [...]. And above all, ceaseless like time, is the dull roar of the breakers on the reef.

   • 1925, Ezra Pound, Canto I:

     And then went down to the ship,

     Set keel to breakers, forth on the godly sea

   • 1979, Stan Rogers, The Flowers of Bermuda:

     There came a cry: Oh, there be breakers dead ahead! / From the collier, Nightingale,

7. (colloquial) A breakdancer.
8. A user of CB radio.

Anagrams

• rebreak

Etymology 1

Etymology 2