Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A coal miner.
  • noun A coal ship.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The gaper, Mya truncata, a bivalve mollusk.
  • noun A digger of coal; one who works in a coal-mine.
  • noun A coal-merchant or dealer in coal.
  • noun A coasting-vessel employed in the coal-trade.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun One engaged in the business of digging mineral coal or making charcoal, or in transporting or dealing in coal.
  • noun A vessel employed in the coal trade.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A person in the business or occupation of producing (digging or mining coal or making charcoal) or in its transporting or commerce.
  • noun nautical A vessel carrying a bulk cargo of coal
  • noun A nickname used by the traveller community, referring to a non-traveller

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun someone who works in a coal mine

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English colier, from col, coal, from Old English.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English colier, from col ("coal")

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Examples

  • Then I called the collier, and Wulfhere questioned him, and soon was glad as I that I had met with him, saying that in an hour we should be in safety.

    A Thane of Wessex 1884

  • Macarthur Coal Ltd, raising the ante in the battle for the collier which is now at the centre of three takeover bids.

    Latest News - Yahoo!7 News 2010

  • Very soon after the pilot left, Captain Henry George Kendall, on his first trip with the Empress, saw a low-lying collier coming up the river.

    Bird Cloud Annie Proulx 2011

  • Well, anyway, it ain't so many years ago that I came ambling in there on a rusty, foul-bottomed, tramp collier from Australia, forty-three days from land to land.

    THE HUSSY 2010

  • The piece is "a hybrid of traditional British collier band and a symphonic brass section."

    A Filmmaker Mines History for Meaning Nicolas Rapold 2011

  • It beggars belief that people with little or no operational experience are calling the shots – would you have a shop owner advise a collier how to mine for coal?

    Be Carefull What You Wish For « POLICE INSPECTOR BLOG Inspector Gadget 2009

  • We were a tramp collier, rusty and battered, with six thousand tons of coal in our hold.

    SMALL-BOAT SAILING 2010

  • Very soon after the pilot left, Captain Henry George Kendall, on his first trip with the Empress, saw a low-lying collier coming up the river.

    Bird Cloud Annie Proulx 2011

  • Very soon after the pilot left, Captain Henry George Kendall, on his first trip with the Empress, saw a low-lying collier coming up the river.

    Bird Cloud Annie Proulx 2011

  • Very soon after the pilot left, Captain Henry George Kendall, on his first trip with the Empress, saw a low-lying collier coming up the river.

    Bird Cloud Annie Proulx 2011

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