Jump To:

• covenanter
  covenanter

  noun

  a person who makes a covenant.
• Covenanter
  Covenanter

  noun

  a person upholding the National Covenant of 1638 or the Solemn League and Covenant of 1643 between Scotland and England to establish and defend Presbyterianism

covenanter

American  

[kuhv-uh-nuhn-ter, kuhv-uh-nan-ter] / ˈkʌv ə nən tər, ˌkʌv əˈnæn tər /

noun

1. a person who makes a covenant.

2. (initial capital letter) a person who, by solemn agreement, pledged to uphold Presbyterianism, especially an adherent of the National Covenant or the Solemn League and Covenant.

---

Covenanter British  

/ ˌkʌvəˈnæntə, ˈkʌvənəntə /

noun

1. a person upholding the National Covenant of 1638 or the Solemn League and Covenant of 1643 between Scotland and England to establish and defend Presbyterianism

---

Etymology

Origin of covenanter

First recorded in 1630–40; covenant + -er ¹

---

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

covenanter Covenanter

Whereas he goes about looking as sober as a covenanter that expected the day of judgment to-morrow and knew he was predestinated for one O' the goats.

From Philip Winwood A Sketch of the Domestic History of an American Captain in the War of Independence; Embracing Events that Occurred between and during the Years 1763 and 1786, in New York and London: written by His Enemy in War, Herbert Russell, Lieutenant in the Loyalist Forces. by Robert Neilson Stephens

A bishop chanting his psalter under the groined roof of cathedral, and a covenanter praying in his hill-side cave, would form an admirable picture of two very different styles of devotion.

From Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge by James Aitken Wylie

Loudon: Scottish lord and covenanter; committed to the Tower for soliciting the aid of the king of France: he was sent to Scotland by Charles.

From The Browning Cyclop?dia A Guide to the Study of the Works of Robert Browning by Edward Berdoe

The press began timidly to venture on books of amusement, in a style of humour which seemed ribald and heathenish to the staid and sober covenanter.

From Milton by Mark Pattison

This must first be put away, if one would be a right covenanter.

From The Auchensaugh Renovation of the National Covenant and Solemn League and Covenant With the Acknowledgment of Sins and Engagement to Duties, as They Were Renewed at Auchensaugh, Near Douglas, July 24, 1712. (Compared With the Editions of Paisley, 1820, and Belfast, 1835.) Also, The Renovation of These Public Federal Deeds Ordained at Philadelphia, October 8, 1880, by the Reformed Presbytery, with Accommodation of the Original Covenants, in Both Transactions, to Their Times and Positions Respectively by The Reformed Presbytery

In Dumbarton the situation was stoked by zealous local ministers, with the Covenanter movement having considerable influence at the time.

From BBC ● Oct. 30, 2025

Their father was a mining engineer from Oil City, Pa. who liked to boast of his Scotch Covenanter descent.

From Time Magazine Archive

Macartney's father, a strict Scots Covenanter minister, taught his children* a firm, old-fashioned set of religious beliefs.

From Time Magazine Archive

And that soul we here find personified in the younger Gilhaize—a type, if there be one in literature, of the Covenanter of the best kind.

From Ringan Gilhaize or The Covenanters by John Galt

He had been a Covenanter of zeal and forwardness till, at a meeting of the Societies, his double-faced guile had been laid bare.

From The Men of the Moss-Hags Being a history of adventure taken from the papers of William Gordon of Earlstoun in Galloway by S. R. (Samuel Rutherford) Crockett

Random Word

Spin the wheel and learn a new word!

---