finder

From Middle English findere, equivalent to find +‎ -er.

• Rhymes: -aɪndə(ɹ)
• IPA^(key): /ˈfaɪndə(ɹ)/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

finder (plural finders)

1. One who finds or discovers something.

   Finders keepers, losers weepers.

   • 2012, Alan R. Romero, Property Law For Dummies, page 229:

     The finder of treasure trove owns it against the landowner and everyone else except the true owner.

2. A device, such as a viewfinder, used to locate a target or other object of interest.
   • 1945, John Steinbeck, Cannery Row:

     Perhaps some electrical finder could have been developed so delicate that it could have located the source of all this spreading joy and fortune.

3. (UK, historical) A person who picks up scraps and oddments to sell to make a living.
   • 1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, published 1861:

     Even the Whitechapel meat-market is less the scene of prey, for it is a series of shops, while Leadenhall presents many stalls, and the finders seem loath to enter shops without some plausible pretext.

• (discoverer): inventor; see also discoverer

• Friden, Friend, friend, frined, redfin, refin'd, refind

From finde (“to find”) +‎ -er.

• IPA^(key): /fenər/, [ˈfenɐ]

finder c (singular definite finderen, plural indefinite findere)

1. finder

See finde.

• IPA^(key): /fendər/, [ˈfenˀɐ]

finder

1. present of finde