captor

/ˈkæptər/

/ˈkæptə/

Other forms: captors

Someone who catches a person or animal and keeps them confined or imprisoned is a captor. Visiting the zoo, you might find yourself wondering if the lions see the zookeepers as friends or as captors.

The word captor sounds a little bit like capture, and it's no coincidence — they're both rooted in the Latin capere, "to take, hold, or seize." So if you capture a cricket and keep it in a little cage, you are its captor. And, when a police force captures a criminal and puts them in prison, the police become captors too. The original meaning of captor was actually "a censor."

Definitions of captor

1. noun

   a person who captures and holds people or animals
   synonyms: capturer

   antonyms:

   liberator

   someone who releases people from captivity or bondage

   types:

   abductor, kidnaper, kidnapper, snatcher

   someone who unlawfully seizes and detains a victim (usually for ransom)

   surpriser

   a captor who uses surprise to capture the victim

   crimp, crimper

   someone who tricks or coerces men into service as sailors or soldiers

   seizer, shanghaier

   a kidnapper who drugs men and takes them for compulsory service aboard a ship

   type of:

   individual, mortal, person, somebody, someone, soul

   a human being