younker

See also: Younker

English

Alternative forms

• yonker (obsolete)

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle Dutch joncker (Dutch jonker, jonkheer), a compound equivalent to jong (“young”) +‎ here (“lord”). Compare junker.

Noun

younker (plural younkers)

1. (archaic) A young man; a lad, youngster.
   • 1883, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island:

     “Jim,” says he, “I reckon we’re fouled, you and me, and we’ll have to sign articles. I’d have had you but for that there lurch, but I don’t have no luck, not I; and I reckon I’ll have to strike, which comes hard, you see, for a master mariner to a ship’s younker like you, Jim.”

2. (obsolete) A young gentleman or knight.
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

     So foorth they went, and both together giusted;
     But that same younker soone was overthrowne

3. (obsolete) A novice; a simpleton; a dupe.
   • c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i]:

     Trimmed like a younker prancing to his love!

4. junker

References

• “younker”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “younker”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.

Anagrams

• Yukoner