Climber

How to spell climber

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce climber

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does climber mean?

1. nounA person who climbs, especially someone who ascends mountains or rock faces as a sport or pursuit.
2. nounA plant that grows upward by clinging to or twining around a support.

Climber in a sentence

• The experienced climber checked every rope before the ascent.

• She trained the climber along the trellis beside the fence.

• Each climber in the group carried a helmet and harness.

• This shady corner suits a vigorous climber such as ivy.

Where does climber come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The root verb 'climb' comes from the Old English climban, meaning 'to mount' or 'to scramble upward', and it belonged to a family of Germanic words connected to 'clamber' and to the idea of clinging on with the hands. The silent 'b' is the real story behind the spelling: in Old and Middle English that 'b' was actually pronounced, much as it once was in 'thumb' and 'lamb', but over the centuries English speakers stopped sounding it while the letter stayed put. The agent suffix '-er' was added to give 'climber', literally 'one who climbs', a formation English has used freely since the medieval period. The same '-mb' pattern that traps writers in 'climb' carries straight through to 'climber', so the spelling keeps a letter the ear never hears. Later the word also came to name a plant that grows upward by clinging, extending the human sense to the botanical one.

How the word is built

• climb (Old English climban, to ascend)
• -er (agent suffix: one who or that which does)