leveller

Plurallevellers

1. 1
   makes everyone equalnouncountable

   Something that makes differences between people, such as class or wealth, count for nothing, and tends to cancel out the advantages some have over others.

   The flood proved a leveller: rich and poor alike lost their homes and queued for the same blankets.

   Many saw national service as a social leveller that threw young men from every background together.

   UsageOften the great leveller, or with an adjective that says how far it reaches: a social leveller.

   Note

   Death is the classic leveller, since it comes to rich and poor alike: Elizabeth Gaskell's Wives and Daughters speaks of "Death, the leveller". A shared misfortune does the same work, and James Fenimore Cooper wrote that "there is no leveller so effectual as a common misfortune".

2. 2
   equal scorenouncountable

   In sport, a goal or other score that pulls a side back on equal terms with the opposition.

   Rovers threw men forward in search of a late leveller.

   Her header was a deserved leveller after twenty minutes of pressure.

   UsageAnother word for equaliser, mostly in football: press for a leveller, snatch a late leveller, concede one.

   Note

   In a cup tie the leveller can be the goal that takes the game to extra time or penalties.

3. 3
   makes things flatnouncountable

   A person, tool or device that makes something level.

   Each foot of the fridge has a small screw leveller that you can adjust by hand.

   The contractor ran a leveller over the ground before the new lawn was sown.

4. 4
   Civil War radicalnounhistoricalcountable

   Someone who belonged to the Levellers, a radical movement of the English Civil War that pressed for a wider vote, equal treatment under the law and religious toleration.

   Jailed for his pamphlets, the Leveller went on arguing from his cell that the law must treat every free man alike.

   Leveller demands for a wider franchise alarmed many in Parliament during the Civil War.

   UsageWritten with a capital L: a Leveller, the Levellers, Leveller demands.

5. 5
   equality supporternouncountable

   A person who holds the political view that the inequality between rich and poor should be done away with.

   Her opponents painted her as a leveller who would tax away every fortune in the country.

   The squire distrusted the new curate, whom he suspected of being a leveller.

   UsageSmall l, unlike the Levellers of the Civil War. Mostly a critical label others put on someone, rarely a compliment.

   Note

   It is usually a label pinned on someone by others, and rarely a compliment: the narrator of Thackeray's The Luck of Barry Lyndon passed among his neighbours for "a dangerous leveller" for voicing his opinions. The word is shared with the Civil War radicals, who, in Goldsmith's History of England, declared "that all men were equal". Source

   Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 4 facts

   • William Makepeace Thackeray wrote The Luck of Barry Lyndon. en.wikipedia.org
   • The narrator reports being considered a dangerous leveller by his neighbours for expressing his opinions. gutenberg.org
   • Levellers was the name of a radical political movement during the English Civil War. en.wikipedia.org
   • Goldsmith's History of England describes the Levellers as declaring that all men were equal; the quoted wording is exact. en.wiktionary.org

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