Crew

How to spell crew

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce crew

What does crew mean?

1. nounA group of people who work together, especially aboard a ship, aircraft, or on a film or building project.
2. verbTo act as a member of a team operating a boat or vessel.

Crew in a sentence

• noun

  The entire flight crew greeted passengers at the door.

• verb

  She learned to crew a racing yacht during the summer.

• noun

  The ship lost contact with its crew during the storm.

• verb

  Two friends agreed to crew for him in the regatta.

Where does crew come from?

Language of origin: French

Crew came into English in the fifteenth century from the Old French creue, which meant an increase, a growth, or a band of reinforcements, and was the feminine past participle of creistre, 'to grow'. That French verb descends in turn from the Latin crescere, meaning 'to grow' or 'to increase', the same root that gives us 'crescent' and 'increase'. The earliest English uses kept the military flavour, naming a fresh body of soldiers sent to swell an existing force. From there the sense softened to any organised band of people working together, especially the sailors who manned a ship, and later the staff of an aircraft, train, or film set. The modern spelling lost the French ending and settled on the simple four letters, but the buried idea of a group that has 'grown' to do a job is still there.

How the word is built

• crew (a single unanalysable root; from Old French creue, an increase or reinforcement)