master mariner

Noun

master mariner (plural master mariners)

1. A seaman who has qualified to be a captain of a merchant ship
   • That B. C. S., late, &c., master mariner, on, &c., at a foreign port or place called Valparaiso, in South America, then and there being the master and commander of the "Henry Clay," ...1849, Francis Wharton, Precedents of Indictments and Pleas
   • He was a Schiff-fuhrer: Ship-conductor. That's how they call a Master Mariner in Germany. I prefer our way. The alliteration is good, and there is something in the nomenclature that gives to us as a body the sense of corporate existence: Apprentice, Mate, Master, in the ancient and honourable craft...1901, Joseph Conrad, Falk: A Reminiscence