colonel

American  

[kur-nl] / ˈkɜr 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.

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colonel British  

/ ˈkɜːnəl /

noun

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

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Pronunciation

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

Etymology

Origin of colonel

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

Example Sentences

Zhou Bo, a retired senior colonel in the PLA, said both China and the U.S. will want to know what AI can actually do on the battlefield before agreeing to any limits.

From The Wall Street Journal

No one more vocally opposed the Apertura than a charismatic army colonel named Hugo Chávez, who had been imprisoned after leading a coup in 1992.

From The Wall Street Journal

On Dec. 15, the European Union added Jacques Baud, a retired Swiss army colonel and former intelligence analyst who lives in Brussels, to its sanctions list.

From The Wall Street Journal

The 37-year-old was told by a man who identified himself as a former air force colonel that the job was in Dubai.

From Barron's

The Prince of Wales, who is the regiment's colonel, was also on hand to dish out dessert to the junior ranks at Combermere Barracks in Windsor on Thursday.

From BBC