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The Various Uses of Corporal
The adjective corporal today usually appears in the phrase corporal punishment, which means "bodily punishment". This used to include such acts as mutilation, branding, imprisonment, and even death. But today execution comes under the separate heading of "capital punishment", which originally involved losing your head (capit- meaning "head"). Milder forms of corporal punishment are used by American parents, and were once common in schools as well. Corporal is occasionally used in other ways; in the traditional church, the "corporal works of mercy" include seven helpful acts such as sheltering the homeless and burying the dead. Corporal as a military rank actually comes from caporal—which has the same root as capital.
Synonyms
Examples of corporal in a Sentence
Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY, 4 Sep. 2023
Hopkins raised his gun to police and footage showed five officers — corporals Z. Devers, K. Slayton, B. Dehn, M. Hanlon and J. Metcalf — firing at Hopkins.
—Giacomo Bologna, Baltimore Sun, 25 Aug. 2023
Roberts-Smith - a retired corporal in the Special Air Service, or SAS - was not in the Sydney courtroom where Justice Anthony Besanko said the newspapers had established the truth of their claims.
—Michael E. Miller, Anchorage Daily News, 2 June 2023
Two days after that incident, a female Detroit police corporal with 26 years on the force was charged with felonious assault, accused of brandishing a firearm during a road rage incident in Madison Heights, police said.
—Andrea May Sahouri, Detroit Free Press, 31 July 2023
After eating dinner with a fellow soldier — a Black friend from high school — Bennett was demoted from corporal to private and reassigned to a lower position.
—David Browne, Rolling Stone, 21 July 2023
Theresa Fanning of Greater Hartford, Connecticut, hadn’t seen her son, Brendan, in 18 months due to his deployment in Japan as a corporal in the Marines.
—Terry Baddoo, USA TODAY, 17 Feb. 2023
While Tuberville’s promotion record is unclear, the Camden (Ark.) News reported on Feb. 7, 1945, that he had been promoted to corporal.
—Glenn Kessler, Anchorage Daily News, 26 July 2023
After failing to stop for a state trooper on I-95 in Houlton, Maine, the suspect drove his truck toward the Canadian Port of Entry, where a corporal opened fire.
—S. Dev, CBS News, 29 May 2023
Daniel Kreps, Rolling Stone, 13 Sep. 2023
Roiland, 42, was charged in Orange County, Calif., with one felony count of domestic battery with corporal injury and one felony count of false imprisonment by menace, violence, fraud and/or deceit.
—Ethan Shanfeld, Variety, 12 Jan. 2023
Examples of those captured in the operations, which spanned 24 cities, include a Mexican man with convictions for inflicting corporal injury to a spouse and willful cruelty to a child as well as two convictions for DUI.
—Adam Shaw, Fox News, 1 Sep. 2020
In her memoir The Intruders, Montandon attributes a series of hauntings that culminated in a corporal tragedy to the bizarre behavior of a disgruntled tarot card reader who may have cursed the apartment the night of that fateful party.
—Hadley Mendelsohn, House Beautiful, 22 June 2023
But Matt pled guilty to the corporal injury on a spouse charge.
—The Foretold Team, Los Angeles Times, 9 May 2023
The first arrest was for corporal injury on a current or former spouse, People reported.
—Brian Niemietz New York Daily News (tns), al, 25 Apr. 2023
The felony charge of inflicting corporal injury on a spouse was reduced to misdemeanor domestic battery.
—Nardine Saad, Los Angeles Times, 18 Aug. 2022
Roiland had faced one count of domestic battery with corporal injury and one count of false imprisonment by menace, violence, fraud and deceit.
—Jonah Valdez Los Angeles Times (tns), al, 23 Mar. 2023
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These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'corporal.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Word History
Noun (1)
borrowed from Middle French, "lowest noncommissioned officer," alteration (by association with cors, corps "body," Latin corporālis "of the body") of caporal, borrowed from Italian caporale "leader of a small military unit," probably from Medieval Latin capor-, capur-, restructuring of Latin capit- (stem of caput "head") + Italian -ale, noun and adjective suffix, going back to Latin -ālis -al entry 1 — more at head entry 1
Adjective
Middle English corporel, corporal, borrowed from Anglo-French & Latin; Anglo-French corporel, borrowed from Latin corporālis "of the body, corporeal," from corpor-, corpus "body" + -ālis -al entry 1 — more at midriff
Noun (2)
Middle English corporalle, borrowed from Anglo-French & Medieval Latin; Anglo-French corporal, borrowed from Medieval Latin corporāle (probably originally as modifying linteāmen "linen cloth" or a word of similar sense), from neuter of Latin corporālis "of the body, corporeal" (alluding to the belief that the eucharistic elements are the body of Christ) — more at corporal entry 2
Noun (1)
1579, in the meaning defined above
Adjective
14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 2
Noun (2)
14th century, in the meaning defined above
Phrases Containing corporal
Dictionary Entries Near corporal
Cite this Entry
“Corporal.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/corporal. Accessed 23 Sep. 2023.
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Kids Definition
corporal
1 of 2 adjective
corporal
2 of 2 noun
Medical Definition
corporal
adjective
More from Merriam-Webster on corporal
Nglish: Translation of corporal for Spanish Speakers
Britannica English: Translation of corporal for Arabic Speakers
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