Wiktionary

muster

See also: Muster

English edit

WOTD – 19 October 2008
 
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Etymology 1 edit

From Middle English musteren, borrowed from Anglo-Norman mostrer, Middle French monstrer, moustrer (whence the noun monstre, which gave the English noun), from Latin mōnstrō (“to show”), from moneō (“to admonish”). Cognate with French montrer (“to show”), Italian mostrare (“to show”), Spanish mostrar (“to show”). See also monster.

Pronunciation edit

Noun edit

muster (plural musters)

  1. A gathering.
    1. An assemblage or display; a gathering, collection of people or things. [from 14th c.]
      • 1743, Richard Steele, Joseph Addison, The Lucubrations of Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq.:
        She seems to hear the Repetition of his Mens Names with Admiration; and waits only to answer him with as false a Muster of Lovers.
      • 1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter 11, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volumes (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, →OCLC:
        Of the temporal grandees of the realm, and of their wives and daughters, the muster was great and splendid.
      • 1920, Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics, Official Year Book of the Commonwealth of Australia, Issue 13,
        The figures from 1788 to 1825 inclusive, as already mentioned, are based on the musters taken in those years; those for subsequent years are based upon estimates made on the basis of Census results and the annual […] .
    2. (military) An assembling or review of troops, as for parade, verification of numbers, inspection, exercise, or introduction into service. [from 15th c.]
      • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):
        Come, let vs take a muster speedily: / Doomesday is neere; dye all, dye merrily.
      • 1663 July 14 (date written; Gregorian calendar), Samuel Pepys, Mynors Bright, transcriber, “July 4th, 1663”, in Henry B[enjamin] Wheatley, editor, The Diary of Samuel Pepys […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to X), London: George Bell & Sons […]; Cambridge: Deighton Bell & Co., published 1893–1899, →OCLC:
        And after long being there, I 'light, and walked to the place where the King, Duke &c., did stand to see the horse and foot march by and discharge their guns, to show a French Marquisse (for whom this muster was caused) the goodness of our firemen […]
      • 2010, Ohtar, "Enthroned", Slechtvalk, A Forlorn Throne.
        To shorten his way and to hasten for the muster he takes a long lost road.
    3. The sum total of an army when assembled for review and inspection; the whole number of effective men in an army.
      • 1594–1597, Richard Hooker, edited by J[ohn] S[penser], Of the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Politie, […], London: […] Will[iam] Stansby [for Matthew Lownes], published 1611, →OCLC, (please specify the page):
        Ye publish the musters of your own bands, and proclaim them to amount of thousands.
    4. (Australia, New Zealand) A roundup of livestock for inspection, branding, drenching, shearing etc. [from 19th c.]
      • 2006, John Gilfoyle, Bloody Jackaroos!, Boolarong Press:
        McGuire took the two of them out to Kidman's Bore on the Sylvester River where about two dozen stockmen from different stations had gathered to tend the muster along the edge of the Simpson Desert.
  2. Showing.
    1. (obsolete) Something shown for imitation; a pattern. [15th–19th c.]
      (Can we find and add a quotation of Ives to this entry?)
      He (the tailor) never measures you; he only asks master for muster, as he terms it, that is for a pattern.
    2. (obsolete) A sample of goods.
      • 1770, Alexander Dalrymple, An Historical Collection of the Several Voyages and Discoveries in the South Pacific Ocean, page 48:
        The beasts they saw here were hogs and little dogs, and they found some hens; here also they found a muster of cloves, ginger, and cinnamon; though the cinnamon was not of the best: […]
      • 1868, Reports of Cases Determined in the Court of Sudder Dewanny Adawlut, page 114:
        A letter from Mr. Downie, dated 14th of January 1807, acknowledging the receipt of one from the plaintiff, transmitting musters of silk, and authorizing the plaintiff, on certain conditions, to proceed in his speculation […]
    3. (obsolete) An act of showing something; a display. [15th–17th c.]
      • 1590, Sir Philip Sidney, Arcadia, Book III:
        Thus all things being condignely ordered, will an ill favoured impatiencie he waited, until the next morning he might make a muster of him selfe in the Iland […]
      • 1647, Beaumont and Fletcher, The Queen of Corinth, act 2:
        And when you find your women's favour fail, / 'Tis ten to one you'll know yourself, and seek me, / Upon a better muster of your manners.
    4. A collection of peafowl. (not a term used in zoology)
Synonyms edit
Derived terms edit
Translations edit

Verb edit

muster (third-person singular simple present musters, present participle mustering, simple past and past participle mustered)

  1. (transitive, obsolete) To show, exhibit. [15th–17th c.]
  2. (intransitive) To be gathered together for parade, inspection, exercise, or the like (especially of a military force); to come together as parts of a force or body. [from 15th c.]
    • 1859, Charles Dickens, The Haunted House:
      We were then in the third week of November; but, we took our measures so vigorously, and were so well seconded by the friends in whom we confided, that there was still a week of the month unexpired, when our party all came down together merrily, and mustered in the haunted house.
    • 1900, James George Frazer, The Golden Bough, volume 3, page 268:
      The whole male population, men and boys, mustered on the top of the hill.
  3. (transitive) To collect, call or assemble together, such as troops or a group for inspection, orders, display etc. [from 15th c.]
    • 12 July 2012, Sam Adams, AV Club Ice Age: Continental Drift
      With the help of some low-end boosting, Dinklage musters a decent amount of kid-appropriate menace—although he never does explain his gift for finding chunks of ice shaped like pirate ships—but Romano and Leary mainly sound bored, droning through their lines as if they’re simultaneously texting the contractors building the additions on their houses funded by their fat sequel paychecks.
  4. (transitive, US) To enroll (into service). [from 19th c.]
  5. (transitive, Australia, New Zealand) To gather or round up livestock.
Synonyms edit
  • (gather, unite): rally
  • (gather troops for review): parade
Derived terms edit
Translations edit
to show, exhibit — see show,‎ exhibit
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Etymology 2 edit

Noun edit

muster (plural musters)

  1. Synonym of mustee
    • 1825, The Gentleman's Magazine, page 4:
      The next, the Quadroon, from the white and mulatto woman. The third descent, from a white and quadroon, is called a muster; from the fourth, between a white and a muster, springs the musteephinas and the fifth descent, viz. from a white and musteephina, is white by law, and of free birth; indeed the two latter classes are as white as a European.
    • 1925, Charles Spurgeon Johnson, Elmer Anderson Carter, Opportunity: Journal of Negro Life, page 291:
      Mixed bloods, they are suspended between two races, — mulattoes, quadroons, musters, mustafinas, cabres, griffies, zambis, quatravis, tresalvis, coyotes, saltatras, albarassados, cambusos, — neither white nor black, but Negroes.

References edit

Anagrams edit

German edit

Pronunciation edit

Verb edit

muster

  1. singular imperative of mustern

Silesian edit

Etymology edit

Borrowed from German Muster.

Pronunciation edit

Noun edit

muster m inan

  1. design, pattern

Further reading edit

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