runholder

English

WOTD – 25 April 2024

Etymology

From run (“rural landholding for farming, usually for running sheep”) +‎ holder.[1][2] Run (noun) is derived from run (“(chiefly Australia, New Zealand) to allow (cattle, sheep, etc.) to graze and move freely on land; to raise (livestock)”, verb).[3]

Pronunciation

Noun

runholder (plural runholders)

  1. (chiefly New Zealand) A person who leases or owns a run (“rural landholding for farming”), especially one for raising sheep. [from 19th c.]
    • 2003, Michael King, The Penguin History of Aotearoa New Zealand, Penguin, published 2023, page 193:
      Edward Stafford […] was a member of the Anglo-Irish gentry and had arrived in Nelson in 1843 to become a runholder.

Translations

References

  1. ^ “runholder, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, March 2011; “runholder, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
  2. ^ Compare “run, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022: “A large open stretch of land used for pasture or the raising of stock.”
  3. ^ “run, n.2”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, July 2023.

Further reading

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