Rhymesters

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A group of individuals skilled in creating poetry with matching sounds at the end of lines
2. People who compose verses characterized by a repetitive musical quality
3. Writers known for their ability to craft rhymes and clever wordplay in their poetic works

Etymology: "Rhymesters" is the plural of "rhymester," a word built from "rhyme" plus the suffix "-ster." That suffix is an old one in English, descended from Old English "-estre," which marked a female worker in words like "spinster" (a woman who spun), but over time it lost that gender meaning and came to denote a person who is associated with, or habitually does, the thing named by the base word. Its ancestry reaches back to a Proto-West Germanic form, so it is a native English element rather than a borrowing from Latin or French. Attaching "-ster" to "rhyme" produced a plain, slightly mocking label for someone who writes verses, one that implies the verses are mechanical or unskilled rather than inspired. The suffix did similar work in words like "trickster" and "gamester," where it sketches a person defined by a habit or occupation.