cadet

noun

ca·​det kə-ˈdet 

plural cadets

1

a

: a younger brother or son

b

: youngest son

c

: a younger branch of a family or a member of it

2

a

: a person in training for a military or naval commission

especially : a student in a service academy

b

: a student at a police academy : a person who is in training to become a police officer

During his swearing-in speech last August, the 54-year-old head cop pointed out that he still wears the same size uniform that he wore when he was a cadet at the Police Academy 34 years ago.

—Bernard C. Parks

3

slang : pimp

cadetship

kə-ˈdet-ˌship 

noun

Synonyms

• fancy man
• pander
• pimp
• procurer

Examples of cadet in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Here’s a link to champions and players selected for youth and cadet national competitions. —Eric Sondheimer, Los Angeles Times, 1 Apr. 2024

In private, Mayorkas—who is short, fit, and bald, with bushy eyebrows and a cadet’s ramrod posture—is ironic, sharp-witted, and charismatic, a raconteur who leaps out of his seat to exaggerate a detail or deliver a punch line. —Jonathan Blitzer, The New Yorker, 17 Feb. 2024

More than 200 cadets would join the infantry and take on the bulk of the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. —Mark Yost, WSJ, 10 Nov. 2023

West Point officials identified the cadet as Havin Morris, 21, in a statement to the Herald on Tuesday. —David Goodhue, Miami Herald, 27 Mar. 2024

The Air Force Academy has always been responsible for shaping cadets into well-rounded, responsible members of society, Torkelson said. —Will Carless, USA TODAY, 22 Mar. 2024

The drink even once sparked a riot at the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1826, when campus staff intervened after cadets, possibly including a young Jefferson Davis, served eggnog at a boisterous Christmas party despite the school’s ban on alcohol. —Taryn White, Smithsonian Magazine, 28 Nov. 2023

The two rows behind him were occupied by young military cadets in uniform. —Paul Tough, New York Times, 17 Mar. 2024

The Prince of Wales was back at the Royal Navy training college in Dartmouth, Devon early on Thursday to see the latest cadets graduate — or pass out — ahead of their military service. —Simon Perry, Peoplemag, 14 Dec. 2023

Word History

Etymology

borrowed from French, going back to Middle French, borrowed from Gascon (15th-century) capdet "chief, captain" (Old Occitan capdel), going back to Vulgar Latin *capitellus "leader," from Latin capit-, caput "head" + -ellus, diminutive suffix, originally from noun stems ending in -ul-, -r-, and -n- — more at head entry 1

Note: Compare capital entry 3, caudillo. In the fifteenth century the younger sons of Gascon nobles, lacking an inheritance, were recruited into the French army to learn the military profession. In this context the Gascon word was loaned into French, but with the sense "younger son," the characteristic feature of these men to the French, rather than with its Gascon meaning. The Gascon connection was soon lost. The -t of capdet shows the peculiar outcome of Latin geminate -ll- in Gascon. The cluster -pd- was simplified in French to -d-.

First Known Use

1610, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

Phrases Containing cadet

• space cadet

Kids Definition

cadet

noun

ca·​det kə-ˈdet 

1

: a student military officer

2

: a student at a military school

cadetship

-ˌship 

noun

Etymology

from French cadet "a younger brother or son, one training for military service," derived from Latin capitellum, literally, "little (younger) head or chief," from caput "head" — related to cad, caddie, capital, captain, chief see Word History at caddie