muster
noun · verb
Simple meaning
An assembling or review of troops, as for parade, verification of numbers, inspection, exercise, or introduction into service.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
muhsterSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈmʌstɚ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
military
An assembling or review of troops, as for parade, verification of numbers, inspection, exercise, or introduction into service.
A gathering of military personnel for duty
“He was thrown in the brig for missing muster.”
The sum total of an army when assembled for review and inspection; the whole number of effective men in an army.
An assemblage or display; a gathering, collection of people or things.
AustraliaNew Zealand
A roundup of livestock for inspection, branding, drenching, shearing etc.
verb
transitive
To collect, call or assemble together, such as troops or a group for inspection, orders, display etc.
transitiveus
To enroll (into service).
transitiveAustraliaNew Zealand
To gather or round up livestock.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C1 · Advanced
- Frequency
- Uncommon
- Typical Use
- Primarily written
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: An assembling or review of troops, as for parade, verification of numbers, inspection, exercise, or introduction into service.
Used this way, muster is a specialist word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. This is a military use: it belongs to service and operational language.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Clinical and technical
- Usage feel
- Technical and specialized
Where it naturally appears
- Military
- Historical writing
- News/reporting
- Technical/specialist writing
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use muster
- “He was thrown in the brig for missing muster.”noun
- “Muster the courage to do something.”verb
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
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Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Inflected forms
Grammatical variations of the same word.
A necessary or essential thing.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
A call of the names of personnel at a military assembly.
Engage somebody to enter the army.
Release from military service.
A list of names of officers and men in a military unit or ship's company.
Gather or bring together.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.