caster

See also: Caster

English

casters on a swivel chair (2)

silver caster (3), early 18th c.

Alternative forms

• castor (British)

Etymology

cast +‎ -er; the wheel sense comes from obsolete cast (“to turn”).

Pronunciation

• (UK, General Australian, New Zealand) IPA^(key): /ˈkɑːstə(ɹ)/, /ˈkæstə(ɹ)/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• (General American, Canada) IPA^(key): /ˈkæstɚ/
• Homophone: castor
• Rhymes: -æstə(ɹ), -ɑːstə(ɹ)

Noun

caster (plural casters)

1. Someone or something that casts.

   a caster of spells

   a caster of stones

   a caster of bronze statuary

   an online caster of video games

   • 2016, C Pam Zhang, How Much of These Hills Is Gold, Virago, page 231:

     She’s never seen a hired man without Anna to command him. He’s eerie as a shadow without its caster.

2. A wheeled assembly attached to a larger object at its base to facilitate rolling. A caster usually consists of a wheel (which may be plastic, a hard elastomer, or metal), an axle, a mounting provision (usually a stem, flange, or plate), and sometimes a swivel (which allows the caster to rotate for steering).

   Many office chairs roll on a set of casters.

3. A shaker with a perforated top for sprinkling condiments such as sugar, salt, pepper, etc.

   Synonym: cruet

   a set of casters

   • 1860–1861, Charles Dickens, chapter VI, in The Uncommercial Traveller‎^[1]:

     Your waiter having settled that point, returns to array your tablecloth, with a table napkin folded cocked-hat-wise (slowly, for something out of window engages his eye), a white wine-glass, a green wine-glass, a blue finger-glass, a tumbler, and a powerful field battery of fourteen casters with nothing in them; […]

   • 1910, O. Henry [pseudonym; William Sydney Porter], “The Girl and the Habit”, in Strictly Business‎^[2]:

     She could keep cool and collected while she collected your check, give you the correct change, win your heart, indicate the toothpick stand, and rate you to a quarter of a cent better than Bradstreet could to a thousand in less time than it takes to pepper an egg with one of Hinkle’s casters.

4. A stand to hold a set of shakers or cruets.
5. (automotive) The angle of the axis around which a car's front wheels rotate when the steering wheel is turned, with a vertical axis being defined as zero caster.
   • 2008, Ronald G Haefner, The Car Care Book‎^[3], →ISBN, page 238:

     In addition, caster helps to reduce steering effort and to return the steering wheel to the center position after a turn.

Derived terms

• figure-caster
• spearcaster
• surf-caster
• surf caster

 

Translations

someone or something that casts

• Bulgarian: леяр (bg) m (lejar)
• Finnish: heittäjä (fi); heitin (fi); valaja (fi), valuri
• Hungarian: hajító (hu), vető (hu), öntő (hu)
• Italian: lanciatore m lanciatrice f; (who spells) incantatore (it) m incantatrice f
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: (thrower) kaster (no) m

wheeled assembly

• Armenian: հոլովակ (hy) (holovak)
• Bulgarian: колелце́ n (kolelcé)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 輪腳／轮脚 (zh) (lúnjiǎo)

• Danish: hjul (da) n (office chairs), møbelhjul n
• Finnish: kalustepyörä, huonekalupyörä, rullapyörä, pyörä (fi)
• French: roulette (fr) f
• German: Rollfuß m, Castor-Rad n, Lenkrolle f
• Greek: καρούλι (el) n (karoúli)
• Hungarian: görgő (hu)
• Italian: montaggio su ruote m
• Japanese: キャスター (kyasutā)
• Polish: koło kastora n
• Portuguese: rodízio (pt) m
• Russian: колёсико (ru) n (koljósiko), ро́лик (ru) m (rólik)
• Slovene: kolešček m
• Spanish: rueda (es) f, ruedita (es) f (Latin America), ruedecita f (Spain)

shaker with perforated top

• Bulgarian: со́лница (bg) f (sólnica)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 調味瓶／调味瓶 (zh) (tiáowèi píng)

• Danish: strødåse c, saltbøsse (da) c (salt shaker), peberbøsse (da) c (pepper shaker)
• Finnish: sirotin (fi)
• German: Streuer (de) m
• Hungarian: szóró (hu), sószóró (hu), sótartó (hu)
• Irish: croiteoir m, ceanastar m
• Italian: spargisale (it) m, saliera (it) f, pepiera f, spargipepe m
• Japanese: 薬味入れ (やくみいれ, yakumiire)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: bøsse m or f

  Nynorsk: bøsse f, børse f

• Polish: pieprzniczka (pl) f (pepper shaker), solniczka (pl) f (salt shaker)
• Russian: пе́речница (ru) f (pérečnica) (pepper shaker), соло́нка (ru) f (solónka) (salt shaker)
• Swedish: ströare

See also

• caster angle
• caster sugar

Verb

caster (third-person singular simple present casters, present participle castering, simple past and past participle castered)

1. To act as a caster

Anagrams

• Cartes, Caters, Cestar, acters, carest, carets, cartes, caters, crates, creats, racest, reacts, recast, rescat, reäcts, traces

French

Etymology

From English cast.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /kas.te/

• Audio

  (file)

Verb

caster

1. (transitive) to cast (a spell)
2. (transitive, film) to cast (into a role)

Conjugation

Conjugation of caster (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	caster
	compound	avoir + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	castant /kas.tɑ̃/
	compound	ayant + past participle
past participle		casté /kas.te/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	caste /kast/	castes /kast/	caste /kast/	castons /kas.tɔ̃/	castez /kas.te/	castent /kast/
	imperfect	castais /kas.tɛ/	castais /kas.tɛ/	castait /kas.tɛ/	castions /kas.tjɔ̃/	castiez /kas.tje/	castaient /kas.tɛ/
	past historic2	castai /kas.te/	castas /kas.ta/	casta /kas.ta/	castâmes /kas.tam/	castâtes /kas.tat/	castèrent /kas.tɛʁ/
	future	casterai /kas.tə.ʁe/	casteras /kas.tə.ʁa/	castera /kas.tə.ʁa/	casterons /kas.tə.ʁɔ̃/	casterez /kas.tə.ʁe/	casteront /kas.tə.ʁɔ̃/
	conditional	casterais /kas.tə.ʁɛ/	casterais /kas.tə.ʁɛ/	casterait /kas.tə.ʁɛ/	casterions /kas.tə.ʁjɔ̃/	casteriez /kas.tə.ʁje/	casteraient /kas.tə.ʁɛ/
(compound tenses)	present perfect	present indicative of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect	imperfect indicative of avoir + past participle
	past anterior2	past historic of avoir + past participle
	future perfect	future of avoir + past participle
	conditional perfect	conditional of avoir + past participle
subjunctive		que je (j’)	que tu	qu’il, qu’elle	que nous	que vous	qu’ils, qu’elles
(simple tenses)	present	caste /kast/	castes /kast/	caste /kast/	castions /kas.tjɔ̃/	castiez /kas.tje/	castent /kast/
	imperfect2	castasse /kas.tas/	castasses /kas.tas/	castât /kas.ta/	castassions /kas.ta.sjɔ̃/	castassiez /kas.ta.sje/	castassent /kas.tas/
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	caste /kast/	—	castons /kas.tɔ̃/	castez /kas.te/	—
compound		—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—
1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en.
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way: past historic → present perfect past anterior → pluperfect imperfect subjunctive → present subjunctive pluperfect subjunctive → past subjunctive (Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81).

Derived terms

• précaster
• recaster