Other forms: shepherds, shepherding, shepherded
A shepherd is somebody who looks after sheep. A shepherd on the hill, the shepherd brought the flock down, a shepherd's hut.
The verb has a useful figurative sense: to shepherd people is to guide them somewhere gently but firmly — she shepherded them into the hall. The religious use is old and strong: a pastor is a shepherd in Latin, and the Good Shepherd is one of the oldest images in Christianity. Note shepherd's pie, which is made with lamb, as against cottage pie, which is beef — a distinction the English take more seriously than a visitor expects.
1nounshepherdSomebody who looks after sheep.
“The shepherd knew every animal by sight.”
2verbguideTo guide people somewhere carefully.
“She shepherded the whole class onto the coach.”
shepherd is a person who tends animals.
Old English sceaphierde is sheep plus herd in its old sense of a herdsman — the same word as in cowherd and goatherd. English kept the compound and lost the simple noun, so herd now means the animals rather than the person.
Old English
sċēaphierde
Middle English
schepherde
English, today
shepherd
Built from
From Middle English schepherde, from Old English sċēaphierde, a compound of sċēap (“sheep”) and hierde (“herdsman”), equivalent to modern sheep + herd.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA
Practised in Work & Careers, Farm & Countryside