colonel

[kur-nl]

noun

1. an officer in the U.S. Army, Air Force, or Marine Corps ranking between lieutenant colonel and brigadier general: corresponding to a captain in the U.S. Navy.

2. a commissioned officer of similar rank in the armed forces of some other nations.

3. an honorary title bestowed by some Southern states, as to those who have brought honor to the state, prominent businesspersons, visiting celebrities, or the like.

   When the vice president visited the state he was made a Kentucky colonel.

4. Older Use.,  (in the South) a title of respect prefixed to the name of distinguished elderly men.

colonel

/ ˈkɜːnəl /

noun

1. an officer of land or air forces junior to a brigadier but senior to a lieutenant colonel

Pronunciation Note

Colonel , with its medial l pronounced as , illustrates one source for the apparent vagaries of English spelling: divergence between a word's orthographic development and its established pronunciation. In this case, English borrowed from French two variant forms of the same word, one pronounced with medial and final , and a second reflecting dissimilation of the first to . After a period of competition, the dissimilated form triumphed in pronunciation, while the spelling colonel became the orthographic standard.

Other Word Forms

• colonelcy noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of colonel¹

1540–50; < Middle French < Italian colon(n)ello, equivalent to colonn(a) column + -ello < Latin -ellus diminutive suffix; so named because such an officer originally headed the first column or company of a regiment

Word History and Origins

Origin of colonel¹

C16: via Old French, from Old Italian colonnello column of soldiers, from colonna _column

Example Sentences

The father-of-six is accused of being a former colonel in Libya's intelligence service and has been in US custody since 2022.

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Republican House Representative Sheri Biggs, who served as a lieutenant colonel in the Air National Guard, said that she supported the defence secretary's efforts to end "woke" policies from the military.

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Espionage allegations have been levelled against several high-ranking Taiwan officials in recent years, including an ex-air force colonel who in 2023 was jailed for 20 years for running a military spy ring for China.

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Soldiers from the Royal Dragoon Guard, of which she had been deputy colonel in chief, carried the coffin from the royal hearse into the cathedral.

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“There’s a chilling effect against pushing back or at least openly questioning any kind of orders,” Rachel E. VanLandingham, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, told me.

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