ringer

See also Ringer

English

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈrɪŋə/
• Rhymes: -ɪŋə(r)
• Rhymes: -ɪŋɡə(ɹ)

Etymology 1

From ring (“to sound a bell”) +‎ -er.

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. Someone who rings, especially a bell ringer.
   • 1863, Jean Ingelow, High Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire,

     Pull, if ye never pull′d before;

     Good ringers, pull your best," quoth he.

2. (mining) A crowbar.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Simmonds to this entry?)

Etymology 2

From ring (“to surround”).

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. (games) In the game of horseshoes, the event of the horseshoe landing around the pole.
2. (uncountable, games) A game of marbles where players attempt to knock each other's marbles out of a ring drawn on the ground.

Etymology 3

Probably from ring the changes.

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. (horse racing) A horse fraudently entered in a race using the name of another horse.
2. (sports) A person highly proficient at a skill or sport who is brought in, often fraudulently, to supplement a team.
3. A person, animal, or entity which resembles another so closely as to be taken for the other; now usually in the phrase dead ringer.

Derived terms

• dead ringer

Etymology 4

Unknown.

Noun

ringer (plural ringers)

1. (UK, dialect) A top performer.
2. (Australia) The champion shearer of a shearing shed.
3. (Australia) A stockman, a cowboy.
   • 1964, Alec Bolton, Walkabout′s Australia, Walkabout magazine, page 107,

     The ringers are the stockmen on a station. The cattle pass through their hands before the drovers lift them and take them along the stock routes that lead to the killing pens in cities.

   • 1987, Geoffrey Atkinson, Philip Quirk. The Australian Adventure: The Explorer′s Guide to the Island Continent, page 175,

     This vast holding is run by six ringers and six boys. A ringer is a qualified stationhand and a boy is a trainee. It takes four years for a boy to become a ringer.

   • 2005, Jake Drake, The Wild West in Australia and America, page 156,

     Most people associated with the Australian beef industry believe the ringer′s skill of throwing cattle by the tail to be a practice that is purely Australian. There is ample evidence however, that it was practised in South and Central America long before it was developed here.

Anagrams

• erring

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Danish

Verb

ringer

1. present tense of ringe

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Swedish

Verb

ringer

1. present tense of ringa.