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Synonyms

crier

American  
[krahy-er] / ˈkraɪ ər /

noun

  • criers
    plural
  1. a person who cries.

  2. a court or town official who makes public announcements.

  3. a hawker.


crier British  
/ ˈkraɪə /

noun

  1. a person or animal that cries

  2. (formerly) an official who made public announcements, esp in a town or court

  3. a person who shouts advertisements about the goods he is selling

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

Inflected Forms

Nouns

Etymology

Origin of crier

1250–1300; Middle English criere < Old French. See cry, -er 1

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:

Are you a big crier in your everyday life?

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 11, 2026

The ignoble battle ends when a neighbor, Mrs. Prothero, shouts that her house is on fire, “announcing ruin like a town crier in Pompeii.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 19, 2025

“I’m a weird crier with movies. Like I won’t cry after I won the Super Bowl. I didn't cry when my kids were born,” he said.

From Salon ● Apr. 7, 2025

Margaret Boyce is soft-spoken, a private person, and certainly not - in her words - a "crier".

From BBC ● Feb. 25, 2024

The crier unslung and pegged the shining harp and, taking Demodokos’s hand, led him along with all the rest—Phaiakian peers, gay amateurs of the great games.

From "The Odyssey" by Homer

Enlisting high cheekboned town criers isn’t the worst idea.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 14, 2026

Instead of caroling and ringing church bells, the most prominent sounds on Christmastide were now town criers calling: "No Christmas! No Christmas!"

From Salon ● Dec. 24, 2024

Fox News: It’s been said you and June Allyson were the town criers of MGM.

From Fox News ● Mar. 20, 2021

Meanwhile, the union jack-suited royal obsessives and self-styled town criers have been demanding information for their travel plans to the birth.

From The Guardian ● Apr. 18, 2019

He found the criers with clarion voices and told them to muster the unshorn Akhaians in full assembly.

From "The Odyssey" by Homer

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