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boss

Pronunciation: /bɒs/

The English word “boss” has 20 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. One who oversees and directs the work of others; a supervisor.
  2. A person in charge of a business or company.
  3. A leader, the head of an organized group or team.
  4. The head of a political party in a given region or district.
  5. The male owner or man in charge of a large rural property.
  6. One's wife.
  7. A term of address to a man, especially a customer; sometimes also to a friend or acquaintance of equal standing.
  8. An enemy, often at the end of a level, that is particularly challenging and must be beaten in order to progress.
  9. A lump-like mass of rock, especially one projecting through a stratum of different rock.
  10. A convex protuberance in hammered work, especially the rounded projection in the centre of a shield.
  11. A protrusion; frequently a cylinder of material that extends beyond a hole.
  12. A knob or projection, usually at the intersection of ribs in a vault.
  13. A roughly cut stone set in place for later carving.
  14. A target block, made of foam but historically made of hay bales, to which a target face is attached.
  15. A wooden vessel for the mortar used in tiling or masonry, hung by a hook from the laths, or from the rounds of a ladder.
  16. A head or reservoir of water.
  17. A hassock or small seat, especially made from a bundle of straw.

verb

  1. To exercise authoritative control over; to tell (someone) what to do, often repeatedly.
  2. To decorate with bosses; to emboss.

adjective

  1. Of excellent quality, first-rate.

Etymology

Borrowed from Dutch baas, from Middle Dutch baes (“master of a household, friend”), from Old Dutch *baso (“uncle, kinsman”), from Proto-West Germanic *baswō, from Proto-Germanic *baswô (“uncle”), perhaps from Proto-Germanic *ba-, *bō- (“father, older male relative”), source also of the English terms babe, boy, bub, bully. Cognate with Middle Low German bās (“supervisor, foreman”), Old Frisian bas…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.