messenger
Americannoun
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a person who carries a message or goes on an errand for another, especially as a matter of duty or business.
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a person employed to convey official dispatches or to go on other official or special errands.
a bank messenger.
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Nautical.
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a rope or chain made into an endless belt to pull on an anchor cable or to drive machinery from some power source, as a capstan or winch.
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a light line by which a heavier line, as a hawser, can be pulled across a gap between a ship and a pier, a buoy, another ship, etc.
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Oceanography. a brass weight sent down a line to actuate a Nansen bottle or other oceanographic instrument.
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Archaic. a herald, forerunner, or harbinger.
verb (used with object)
noun
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a person who takes messages from one person or group to another or others
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a person who runs errands or is employed to run errands
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a carrier of official dispatches; courier
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nautical
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a light line used to haul in a heavy rope
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an endless belt of chain, rope, or cable, used on a powered winch to take off power
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archaic a herald
Etymology
Origin of messenger
1175–1225; Middle English messager, messangere < Anglo-French; Old French messagier. See message, -er 2
Explanation
Use the noun messenger to refer to someone who brings you a message. Your mail carrier delivering a postcard and your gossipy friend calling to give you the latest news can each be described as a messenger. Delivering messages for others is certainly a time-honored profession, since even the gods of Antiquity needed someone to do it — the Greeks had Hermes and the Romans had Mercury as their messenger gods. A messenger carries a message, and that's where the word itself comes from: the Latin root of message is missus, which means "a sending away, sending, dispatching" and is the past participle of mittere, "send."
Vocabulary lists containing messenger
This Week In Words: November 21–27, 2020
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Messenger
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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.
Harry’s aunt and uncle have been preventing such dispatches from reaching the young wizard-to-be, but the boarding school’s messenger owls are having none of it.
From Los Angeles Times • May 14, 2026
As part of the push for a "sovereign internet", the government is promoting a state-backed Russian messenger called MAX.
From BBC • Apr. 24, 2026
The partnership expects to fund various types of vaccines, including those based on messenger RNA.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 17, 2026
Dopamine is a chemical messenger that plays a critical role in controlling movement, as well as supporting memory, mood, and other essential functions.
From Science Daily • Feb. 20, 2026
He pretended, therefore, that he had gone mad, and when a messenger from the Greek Army arrived, the King was plowing a field and sowing it with salt instead of seed.
From "Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes" by Edith Hamilton
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.
