Ketch

Definitions

1. A fore-and-aft rigged sailing vessel with two masts, main and mizzen, the mizzen being stepped forward of the rudder post.
2. Synonym of Jack Ketch (“a public executioner”).
3. A hangman.
4. A pie or turnover.
   UK, dialectal

Equivalents

Examples

“[…] to finish⟳ her new Habit or Appearance, and make⟳ her Change⟳ compleat, he ordered her Sails to be alter’d; and as she sailed before with a Half-Sprit, like⟳ a Yacht, she sailed now with square Sail⟳ and Mizen Mast, like⟳ a Ketch; so that, in a Word, she was a perfect Cheat […]”

“Hanging was indeed the popular remedy for all criminal disorders. The legislator found patients for it, the judge⟳ prescribed it, and the Ketch administered it with the same callous and gallows indifference.”

CEFR level