timekeeper
nounEtymology From time + keeper.
1
A device that shows the time; a timepiece.
- The sailors sail by chronometers that do not lose two or three seconds in a year, ever since [Isaac] Newton explained to Parliament that the way to improve navigation was to get good watches, and to offer public premiums for a better time-keeper than any then in use.1878 March 30, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Fortune of the Republic. Lecture Delivered at the Old South Church, March 30, 1878, Boston, Mass.: Houghton, Osgood and Company […], published 1878, →OCLC, page 1:
2
A person who keeps records of the hours of attendance of employees.
3
Hobbies, Lifestyle, Sports A person who records the time elapsed in a sporting event.
4
Entertainment, Lifestyle, Music The group member who controls the rhythm of the music when a group of musicians play together.
- There was no consensus among jazz musicians about who was the primary timekeeper in a jazz band; some said the drummers and others said the bassist.2011, Harris M. Berger, Metal, Rock, and Jazz: Perception and the Phenomenology of Musical Experience, Wesleyan University Press, →ISBN, page 152:
5
Usually, With adjective A person (or something controlled by a person) that is punctual.
- As it happens, the Leicester–Beeston train is quite a good timekeeper—it sometimes runs a few minutes early— […]1961 April, Warren Smith, “The problems of train regulation - a study of operation at Trent”, in Trains Illustrated, page 217:
- Related terms
- timekeeping