FIGUREHEAD • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Figurehead

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/fˈɪgjərhˌɛd/ Listen

noun

Figurehead n.

(Naut.) The figure, statue, or bust, on the prow of a ship.

A person who allows his name to be used to give standing to enterprises in which he has no responsible interest or duties; a nominal, but not real, head or chief.

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Etymology of 'Figurehead'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Figurehead" Quotes from Famous Books

... forward tensely, her hands shut in excitement and emotion; and she relaxed with a happy laugh as the Nautilus, with her yards exactly square and rigging taut, her sides and figurehead and ports bright with newly laid on paint, ...

— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer

... building of the Persian, we had taken great pride in the modelling and finish of the old style of cutwater and figurehead, with bowsprit and jib-boom; but in urging the advantages of greater length of hull, we were met by the fact of its being simply impossible in certain docks to swing vessels of any greater length than those already constructed. Not to be beaten, we proposed to do away with all these overhanging encumbrances, ...

— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles

... chance and the agreement of men have picked out as symbols and convenient indications of some particular group or temperament of opinions. To the latter it is that Sir Thomas More belongs. An age and a type of mind have found in him and his Utopia a figurehead and a token; and pleasant and honourable as his personality and household present themselves to the modern reader, it is doubtful if they would by this time have retained any peculiar distinction among the many other contemporaries of whom we have chance glimpses ...

— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells

... length, low amidships and curving upwards to high peaks at stem and stern, both of which converged to sharp edges. It resembled an enormous canoe rather than aught else to which we can compare it. On the stem was a carved and gilt dragon, the figurehead of the ship, which glittered in the bright rays of the sun. Along the bulwarks of the ship, fore and aft, hung rows of large painted wooden shields, which gave an Argus-eyed aspect to the craft. Between them was a double row of thole-pins for the great oars, ...

— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... throne of the Incas to rule in accordance with the dictates of Spain. The young prince, Manco, a son of the great Inca Huayna Capac, named for the first Inca, Manco Ccapac, the founder of the dynasty, was selected as the most acceptable figurehead. He was a young man of ability and spirit. His induction into office in 1534 with appropriate ceremonies, the barbaric splendor of which only made the farce the more pitiful, did little to gratify his natural ...

— Inca Land - Explorations in the Highlands of Peru • Hiram Bingham

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