Word.ws English Dictionary

past masters

past masters is the plural of past master.

Meaning of past master

Noun

past master (plural past masters)

  1. One who has an extremely high level of ability or knowledge within an area of achievement or expertise.
    • It required a deft hand and deep knowledge of the barbaric mind effectually to handle such diverse weapons; but he was a past-master in the art, knowing when to conciliate and when to threaten with Jove-like wrath.1900 April 7, Jack London, “The Son of the Wolf”, in The Son of the Wolf: Tales of the Far North, Boston, Mass.; New York, N.Y.: Houghton, Mifflin and Company […], →OCLC, page 24
  2. Someone who has previously been a master at a given lodge.

Questions about past masters

What is past masters the plural of?
Past masters is the plural of past master.

Words near past masters in the dictionary

  1. past it
  2. past iterative
  3. past life
  4. past lives
  5. past master
  6. past masters
  7. past mistress
  8. past mistresses
  9. past one's prime
  10. past paper
  11. past papers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: past masters (page history and authors); past master (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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