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sitter

1 American  
[sit-er] / ˈsɪt ər /

noun

  1. a person who sits. sit.

  2. a brooding hen.

  3. a person who stays with young children while the parents go out; baby-sitter.

  4. a person who provides routine or custodial care temporarily or part-time, as for an elderly person or a pet whose owner is on vacation.

  5. Slang. the buttocks; rump.

Sitter 2 American  
[sit-er] / ˈsɪt ər /

noun

  1. Willem de 1872–1934, Dutch astronomer and mathematician.

sitter 1 British  
/ ˈsɪtə /

noun

  1. a person or animal that sits

  2. a person who is posing for his or her portrait to be painted, carved, etc

  3. a broody hen or other bird that is sitting on its eggs to hatch them

  4. (in combination) a person who looks after a specified person or thing for someone else

    flat-sitter

  5. short for baby-sitter

  6. anyone, other than the medium, taking part in a seance

  7. anything that is extremely easy, such as an easy catch in cricket

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Sitter 2 British  
/ ˈsɪtə /

noun

  1. Willem de (ˈwɪləm də). 1872–1934, Dutch astronomer, who calculated the size of the universe and conceived of it as expanding

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of sitter

Middle English word dating back to 1300–50; sit 1, -er 1

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

“Celebrating that the great Reynolds portrait Omai — Mai as he was actually named — is to stay!” a prominent British historian tweeted, correcting the Polynesian sitter’s name.

From Los Angeles Times

But when the sitter was involved in a car accident, the abandoned animals, hungry and lonely, began howling.

From Los Angeles Times

Under less obligation to please the sitter, he could veer further from the expectation of seriousness and sobriety and be more responsive to character.

From Washington Post

Where it is going to get tricky, she says, is as oil prices go up, the invasion drags on, and the atrocities pile up, how long the fence sitters can stay silent.

From BBC

Christ and his disciples, robed and bewigged, are here a rather creepy and forbidding bunch, the makeup so pronounced that it’s sometimes hard to tell the costumed sitter’s gender.

From Los Angeles Times

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.