saddle
n. countablen. a leather seat that you put on a horse's back so you can ride it comfortably. It is usually shaped to help you stay balanced while the animal moves.
n. a seat for a rider, typically made of leather and secured to the back of a horse by a girth. In broader mechanical contexts, it refers to a support member or a sliding part that carries another component.
He tightened the straps on the saddle before climbing onto the horse.
After riding for six hours across the valley, the traveler felt quite sore from the stiff leather saddle.
The master saddler spent weeks hand-stitching the seat to ensure it would distribute the rider's weight evenly across the horse's spine without causing pressure points.
From Middle English sadel, from Old English sadol, from Proto-West Germanic sadul, from Proto-Germanic sadulaz (“saddle”). Further etymology uncertain, perhaps from Proto-Indo-European sod-dʰlo-, from sed- (“to sit”) + -dʰlom (a variant of -trom (suffix forming nouns denoting instruments or tools)), though the Oxford English Dictionary says this “presents formal difficulties”. Cognates * Danish sadel * Dutch zadel * German Sattel * Icelandic söðull * Low German Sadel * Russian седло́ (sedló) * Saterland Frisian Soadel * Scots sadil * Swedish sadel * West Frisian seal
From Middle English sadelen (“to put a saddle on (an animal), to saddle”) [and other forms], from Old English sadolian, sadelian, sadilian (“to saddle”), from Proto-Germanic sadulōną (“to saddle”), from sadulaz (“a saddle”, noun) (see further at etymology 1) + *-ōną (suffix forming denominative verbs from nouns). Cognates * Middle Dutch sādelen (modern Dutch zadelen) * Middle Low German sādelen * Old Danish sathlæ (modern Danish sadle) * Old High German satalōn, satulōn (Middle High German satelen, sateln, German satteln) * Old Norse sǫðla * Old Swedish saþla (modern Swedish sadla)
Commonly used with the verb 'to be in the saddle' to mean being in control of a situation.