Golfer

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˈɡɒlfə(ɹ)/

Definitions

1. A person who engages in the activity of hitting a small ball with clubs to get it into sequential holes situated on a turf course
2. An individual who participates in the game where a ball is struck towards a series of holes arrayed throughout a manicured landscape using different clubs
3. An individual who plays a sport involving striking a small ball into a series of holes using various clubs on a specially designed outdoor course

Etymology: The word is about as transparent as English gets: "golf" with the agent suffix "-er," meaning one who does a thing. The suffix has a longer pedigree than the sport's name. It descends from Latin "-arius," which denoted a person connected with something, and passed into English through Old French "-ier" and Middle English "-er." Old English already had its own "-ere" ending, so the two forms reinforced each other as the language developed. The more interesting question is the first half. "Golf" was borrowed from Middle Scots before it became English, so the sport's name had Scottish roots when "golfer" was formed from it. Once "golf" was a noun for the game, adding "-er" to name the player was the natural move, and the result is one of the few English sports words built this way with a suffix that is itself a centuries-old inheritance.

Synonyms: player, athlete