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coopers

Craft Terms
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Makers or repairers of wooden casks, barrels, and other containers.

Detailed Definition
A cooper is a craftsperson who makes and repairs wooden barrels and casks by fitting curved staves with hoops. “Coopers” appears among the specialized trades contributing to London’s noisy morning commerce.
Example
Example in poetry:
“Knife-grinders, coopers, squeaking cork-cutters” lists trades, with coopers making or repairing barrels and casks; Crabbe’s village poetry often names laborers to ground verse in social life; A cooper’s hoop, stave, and mallet offer concrete sound imagery for an industrial or harbor poem; A contemporary historical poem might invoke coopers beside warehouse workers to recover overlooked skilled labor
Additional Notes
“Coopers” names a specialized historical trade in the list “Knife-grinders, coopers, squeaking cork-cutters.”; Found in the poem, London's Summer Morning by Mary Robinson
Also Known As
barrel-makers cask artisans cooperage barrel craftsmen
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