plumber

CEFRA2

/ˈplʌmə/

noun

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

01
noun
A person who installs and repairs water pipes.
02
noun
Extra detail
A person who investigates or prevents leaks of information.

Examples

Not only is there no God, but try getting a plumber on weekends.
The plumber pumped the water out of the pipe.

At a glance

Sits at A2 on the CEFR scale

Senses: 5
Parts of speech: 1
Citations: 5
Synonyms: 2

Also pronounced

/pləm(b)ə(r)/

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

One who furnishes, fits, and repairs pipes and other apparatus for the conveyance of water, gas, or drainage.
One who works in or with lead.
In the Royal Navy, an apprentice, a boy aged 16 to 18, who is trained in technical skills at the Dockyard Schools to become an artificer.

More examples

In context

Mario and Luigi's profession is plumbers.
Hannah Spencer, a local plumber and Green party councillor, was elected as the party’s first MP in northern England after overturning Labour’s 13,000-vote majority.
It involved the break-in of the office of Mr. Lewis Fielding, Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist, by the White House “plumbers.”

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

The professional blank came to fix the broken pipe under the kitchen sink.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Citations

The word in print, with each source given in full.

Hannah Spencer, a local plumber and Green party councillor, was elected as the party’s first MP in northern England after overturning Labour’s 13,000-vote majority.
2026 February 27, Josh Halliday, “Green party wins Gorton and Denton byelection, pushing Labour to third place in blow to Keir Starmer”, in The Guardian, →ISSN
It involved the break-in of the office of Mr. Lewis Fielding, Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist, by the White House “plumbers.”
1979, United States. Congress. House. Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. Subcommittee on Legislation, Espionage Laws and Leaks: Hearings Before the Subcommittee...
[…] began the month with an operation at St. Joseph Hospital in Aurora, Ill. His surgeon, by the way, was a "plumber” – urologist.
1958, Father Provincial Assumption B.V.M. Monastery, The Chronicle, volumes 12-13, page 39
Within surgery, the "cleaner" specialties, such as cardiac and neurosurgery, outrank the plumbers (urologists) and proctologists.
1983, Toni Martin, How to Survive Medical School, page 127
There is nothing to work him into a fine feeling of agony and despair like an exam scheduled for the next day, or a paper to write, or a concert in which he is to sing. Wish him the top of the morning when he is looking forward to one of these events, and then hear the woeful story of how badly he is going to be plumbered.
1930, “Paul Thomas Martin”, in Joseph W. Martin, editor, The Record, Haverford, Pa.: The Class of 1930, Haverford College, →OCLC, page 54

Keep plumber

Looking a word up is the easy part. LexUp remembers which words you have met and brings them back at the point you were about to forget them.

Download on theApp Store Get it onGoogle Play

Origin

noun

From Middle English plumber, from Old French plummier (French plombier); from Latin plumbārius, from plumbum (“lead or lead shot”). The verb sense “to botch” is perhaps from the negative stereotype of the occupation.

Deep Dive

noun

More examples

Related

Quick test

The professional blank— came to fix the broken pipe under the kitchen sink.

Nearby

Origin

noun

The professional blank came to fix the broken pipe under the kitchen sink.