Pounder

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˈpaʊndə/

Definitions

1. A heavy tool or weapon used to strike or crush ; a person or device that pounds or crushes substances or objects
2. An instrument designed for delivering powerful blows to materials ; an individual or mechanism that compacts or smashes items by repeated striking
3. A blunt object or weapon applied with force to break or press ; someone or something that exerts pressure repeatedly to crush or grind

Etymology: A pounder is, at heart, just a thing that pounds, and its history is mostly the history of the suffix "-er" attached to a verb. The verb "pound" came into English from Old English "pūnian," meaning to pound, bruise or beat. Adding "-er" to a verb to name the agent that performs the action is one of the most productive habits in the language, so "pounder" joins a long line of such formations, from "baker" to "hunter." The more curious part is that "pound" has at least three separate roots that happen to look identical. One is the verb to beat. Another is the unit of weight, which comes from Latin "pondo," meaning by weight, and passed into Old English as "pund." A third is the unit of money, drawn from the same Latin source via a pound of silver. Because the three share a spelling, a pounder can be read as something that beats, something that weighs a particular number of pounds, or something that handles currency, though the verb sense is the one that matters here.

Synonyms: hammer, mallet, club