reaper means one who reaps; a person employed to harvest crops from the fields by reaping. Lexicurio rates it Rare gem — a strength score of 71 out of 100.
reaper is pronounced /ˈɹiːpɚ/.
Why “reaper” is a great word
REAPER — [Noun] One who cuts and gathers ripened grain, or, in figurative use, the personification of death as a harvester of souls. From Middle English reper, repare, from Old English rīpere ("reaper, harvester"), from the verb rīpan ("to reap") + the agent suffix -ere ("-er"). Attested before 1000. Unlike "harvester," which broadly names any gatherer or the season itself, or "scythe," which is merely the silent tool, "reaper" is the relentless agent of the cut. It is the stooped figure with a grim, rhythmic swing at the end of a golden field; the mechanical clatter of the combine at dusk; and the cloaked silhouette for whom every life is a season's yield—the final, inevitable logic of gathering what has been sown.
Etymology
From Middle English reper, repare, repere, *riper (the last, attested only in surnames Ryper, Riper, etc.), from Old English rīpere (“reaper”), equivalent to reap + -er.
noun
- One who reaps; a person employed to harvest crops from the fields by reaping.“Even as we looked some rumour seemed to have spread, for we saw the reapers hurrying from the fields.”
- A machine used to harvest crops.
- A recluse spider (Loxosceles and Sicarius spp.).
- Each of the small laths laid across the rafters of a sloping roof to bear the tiles.