homer
Meaning
A home run in baseball
A homing pigeon
To hit a home run
Structure
Usage
The rookie hit a walk-off homer to win the championship.
They used a homer to carry the message across enemy lines.
He homered twice in yesterday's game, driving in five runs.
Etymology
The word "homer" is a transparent modern compound formed from the native English word "home." Its sporting sense, first recorded in 1868, is a direct and logical extension of the baseball term "home run," where "home" signifies the final base which scores a run. The agent suffix "-er" is attached to denote the player who hits the ball allowing them to round the bases to home plate, or the hit itself that enables this action. The term for a homing pigeon (1880) follows an identical morphological logic, describing a bird bred and trained to return to its home loft. Thus, "homer" exemplifies how English readily creates new, specific terms by combining a core concept of destination with a productive suffix.
Analysis
- home: Old English, meaning "dwelling, house, estate, village." In this context, it functions as the base meaning "the goal or destination." - er: Old English, an agent noun suffix indicating "one who does or is associated with." In this context, it forms a noun meaning "one that goes home" or "that which achieves home."