DRAKE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does Drake mean? 

• DRAKE (noun)
  The noun DRAKE has 2 senses:

1. English explorer and admiral who was the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe and who helped to defeat the Spanish Armada (1540-1596)

2. adult male of a wild or domestic duck

  Familiarity information: DRAKE used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DRAKE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

English explorer and admiral who was the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe and who helped to defeat the Spanish Armada (1540-1596)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

Drake; Francis Drake; Sir Francis Drake

Instance hypernyms:

admiral; full admiral (the supreme commander of a fleet; ranks above a vice admiral and below a fleet admiral)

navigator (in earlier times, a person who explored by ship)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Adult male of a wild or domestic duck

Classified under:

Nouns denoting animals

Hypernyms ("drake" is a kind of...):

duck (small wild or domesticated web-footed broad-billed swimming bird usually having a depressed body and short legs)

 Context examples 

He will have a very pretty income to make ducks and drakes with, and earned without much trouble.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

We'll have favourable winds, a quick passage, and not the least difficulty in finding the spot, and money to eat, to roll in, to play duck and drake with ever after.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

He soon made ducks and drakes of what I gave him, sank lower and lower, married another woman, I believe, became an adventurer, a gambler, and a cheat.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)