sentinel.
A sentry, watch, or guard.
Meaning & usage
A sentry, watch, or guard.
A private soldier.
A unique value recognised by a computer program for processing in a special way, or marking the end of a set of data.
The <xmp> tag is a sentinel that suspends web-page processing and displays the subsequent text literally
A sentinel crab.
A sign of a health risk (e.g. a disease, an adverse effect).
sentinel animals can be used to explore endemic diseases.
Where this word comes from
First attested in the 1570s from Middle French sentinelle (“watch or guard kept by a soldier”), from Old Italian sentinella, probably from sentina + -ella, from sentire (“perceive, watch, hear”), from sentiō (“feel, perceive by the senses”). See also sense, sentient.
To watch over as a guard.
He sentineled the north wall.
To post a guard for.
He sentineled the north wall with just one man.
Where this word comes from
First attested in the 1570s from Middle French sentinelle (“watch or guard kept by a soldier”), from Old Italian sentinella, probably from sentina + -ella, from sentire (“perceive, watch, hear”), from sentiō (“feel, perceive by the senses”). See also sense, sentient.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.