jockey
/ˈd͡ʒɑki/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.57 in modern English
22
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
One who rides racehorses competitively.
noun
That part of a variable resistor or potentiometer that rides over the resistance wire
Example Sentences
- "And the crime for which Nuncomar was about to die was regarded by them in much the same light in which the selling of an unsound horse, for a sound price, is regarded by a Yorkshire jockey."
- "They were jockeying for position toward the end of the race."
- "I love jockeying that motorcycle through heavy traffic."
- "They're all jockeying for promotion."
- "This particularly obtains in all Parliamentary affairs. Whether the business in hand be to get a man in, or get a man out, or get a man over, or promote a railway, or jockey a railway, or what else, nothing is understood to be so effectual as scouring nowhere in a violent hurry—in short, as taking cabs and going about."
- "I've been jockeyed into doing work for which I get no credit."
Etymology
Etymology tree Biblical Hebrew עָקַב Biblical Hebrew יַעֲקֹב (yaʿăqōḇ)bor. Ancient Greek Ἰακώβ (Iakṓb) Ancient Greek Ἰάκωβος (Iákōbos)bor. Latin Iācōbusslbor.? French Jacquesder. Middle English Jackin English Jack English Jock English jock Proto-Germanic *-j-, *-ij- Proto-West Germanic *-i, *-ī Old English -iġ Middle English -y English -y ▲ English -y English -ie English -ey English jockey The word is by origin a diminutive of jock, the Northern English or Scots colloquial equivalent of the first name John, which is also used generically for "boy" or "fellow" (compare Jack, Dick), at least since 1529. A familiar instance of the use of the word as a name is in "Jockey of Norfolk" in Shakespeare's Richard III. v. 3, 304. Equivalent to jock + -ey. In the 16th and 17th centuries the word was applied to horse-dealers, postilions, itinerant minstrels and vagabonds, and thus frequently bore the meaning of a cunning trickster, a "sharp", whence the verb to jockey, "to outwit" or "to do" a person out of something. The current meaning of a person who rides a horse in races was first seen in 1670.
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈd͡ʒɑki/
- British English: /ˈd͡ʒɒki/