boatman
Americannoun
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a person skilled in the use of small craft.
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a person who sells, rents, or works on boats.
noun
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a man who works on, hires out, repairs, or operates a boat or boats
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short for water boatman
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of boatman
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
According to legend, it took rough and rugged characters to tame the early American frontier: men like Daniel Boone, the trailblazer, or Mike Fink, the brawling river boatman.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 26, 2026
"I'm an old boatman, I have experienced another four floods in the village. This was the worst," he told media.
From Reuters ● Sep. 9, 2023
As the skilled boatman guides the outrigger across the reef and into the shallows, Agutaya looks like a piece of paradise.
From BBC ● Jun. 9, 2023
The baby-faced boatman, who stands out among the weathered older sailors at Star Ferry, said he would spend the rest of his life on the water if given the chance.
From New York Times ● Apr. 19, 2022
If she hung a black petticoat on her clothesline, it meant that another member of the ring, Caleb Brewster, a blacksmith and boatman, had arrived in his boat.
From "George Washington, Spymaster" by Thomas B. Allen
Certainly the good Samaritans must have known the two boatmen were not going to be put on trial, owing to lack of evidence.
From Slate ● Oct. 21, 2025
The famous Dal Lake, as seen in the picture above, and other water bodies in Kashmir have partially frozen, making it hard for boatmen to ferry passengers and tourists.
From BBC ● Jan. 2, 2024
Just before the accident, onlookers from the river bank were shouting at the boatmen to navigate carefully.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 27, 2022
What takes me by surprise is the warmth of the boatmen, Italian American, old, kind, used to Hindu families carrying out the ritual of scattering ashes on water.
From Salon ● Jun. 25, 2022
Unfortunately, he had gone 15 miles when he came to the junction of the Weser, and so to a stretch of river over which a guild of boatmen held a monopoly.
From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
