corporal

1 of 3

noun (1)

: a noncommissioned officer ranking in the army above a private first class and below a sergeant and in the marine corps above a lance corporal and below a sergeant

corporal

2 of 3

adjective

1
: of, relating to, or affecting the body
corporal punishment
corporal works of mercy
2
obsolete : corporeal, physical
corporally adverb

corporal

3 of 3

noun (2)

cor·​po·​ral ˈkȯr-p(ə-)rəl How to pronounce corporal (audio)
: a linen cloth on which the eucharistic elements are placed

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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.

Examples of corporal in a Sentence

Adjective started to suffer the corporal ailments that come with advancing age
Recent Examples on the Web
Noun
He was promoted to corporal, awarded the Military Medal and assigned to Colonel Stirling’s S.A.S. planning staff as the principal navigator for future missions, including attacks on airfields at Surt, El Agheila and Nofilia and supply dumps along Rommel’s lengthening advance eastward. Robert D. McFadden, New York Times, 4 Jan. 2024 According to Crump, Wade was crossing Interstate 55 around 8 p.m. on March 5 when an off-duty corporal hit him with a police SUV. Jonathan Edwards, Washington Post, 21 Nov. 2023 The soldiers from the Third Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment, marched into the city after police pistol-whipped and shot at a Black corporal Charles Baltimore, resulting in a brawl that claimed the lives of 19 people, including four African-American troops. Melissa Noel, Essence, 15 Nov. 2023 The Princess promoted the pony from lance corporal to corporal before departing the barracks by helicopter. Ollie MacNaughton, Glamour, 8 Nov. 2023 Those materials show that just before 8 p.m. on March 5, Dexter was walking across Interstate 55, a six-lane highway, when a Jackson police SUV driven by an off-duty corporal struck him in the southbound lanes. Jon Schuppe, NBC News, 25 Oct. 2023 The corporal, did alert police about the crash and was injury-free. Rayna Reid Rayford, Essence, 26 Oct. 2023 The corporal, who alerted police to the collision, was not injured. Jon Schuppe, NBC News, 25 Oct. 2023 Earlier this month, The Sun also first reported on a corporal who sent a meme mocking George Floyd’s murder, a week after Minneapolis police killed him. Darcy Costello, Baltimore Sun, 21 Aug. 2023
Adjective
The unrelated warrant accuses the 21-year-old man of assault likely to produce great bodily injury and inflicting corporal injuries on a spouse or cohabitant. Ishani Desai, Sacramento Bee, 6 Feb. 2024 Eeny, meeny, miny, moe … This singsong, which required neither hat nor app, had on me the effect of brisk corporal isolation, an ironic effect of a gifting community. Michelle Madden, New York Times, 21 Oct. 2023 At the time of the shooting, Wilkes was an active member of the Alabama Army National Guard as a corporal and infantry fire team leader who joined the guard in 2010. Carol Robinson | Crobinson@al.com, al, 18 Aug. 2023 This cosmic combo gives you incredible vitality, corporal strength, and a spirit of leadership. Narayana Montúfar, Women's Health, 13 Aug. 2023 In January 2023, authorities arrested Roiland and charged him with one felony count of domestic battery with corporal injury and one felony count of false imprisonment by menace, violence, fraud, and/or deceit following the incident. 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

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

Etymology

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

First Known Use

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

Time Traveler
The first known use of corporal was in the 14th century

Dictionary Entries Near corporal

Cite this Entry

“Corporal.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/corporal. Accessed 18 Mar. 2024.

Kids Definition

corporal

1 of 2 adjective
cor·​po·​ral ˈkȯr-p(ə-)rəl How to pronounce corporal (audio)
: of or relating to the body
whipping and other corporal punishments
corporally
adverb

corporal

2 of 2 noun
: a noncommissioned officer in the army or marines with a rank just below that of sergeant

Medical Definition

corporal

adjective
cor·​po·​ral ˈkȯr-p(ə-)rəl How to pronounce corporal (audio)
: of, relating to, or affecting the body
corporal punishment

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