carpenter

What it means

1. A person skilled at carpentry, the trade of cutting and joining timber in order to construct buildings or other structures.

   Synonyms: joiner, chippy, timberwright, treewright, woodworker, woodwright

2. nauticalA senior rating in ships responsible for all the woodwork onboard; in the days of sail, a warrant officer responsible for the hull, masts, spars and boats of a ship, and whose responsibility was to sound the well to see if the ship was making water.
3. A two-wheeled carriage.

In a sentence

The large, stout African bees are carpenters (Xylocopa), making small tunnels in timber, housing few individuals.

1968, Elliot C. G. Pinhey, Introduction to insect study in Africa, page 146

Where it comes from

1. Proto-Celtic*karbantos“chariot, war chariot”
2. Gaulishcarbantos
3. Latincarpentum“a two-wheeled carriage, coach, or chariot, a cart”
4. Latincarpentārius“a wagon-maker, carriage-maker”
5. Late Latincarpentārius“a carpenter”
6. Anglo-Normancarpenter
7. Middle Englishcarpenter
8. Englishcarpenter

From Middle English carpenter, from Anglo-Norman carpenter (compare Old French charpentier), from Late Latin carpentārius (“a carpenter”), from Latin carpentārius (“a wagon-maker, carriage-maker”), from Latin carpentum (“a two-wheeled carriage, coach, or chariot, a cart”), from Gaulish carbantos, from Proto-Celtic *karbantos (“chariot, war chariot”), probably related to Proto-Celtic *karros (“wagon”). Doublet of carpintero. More at car. Displaced native Old English trēowwyrhta (literally “tree worker”).