third-rate adjective 2noun 1forms 2 adjective2 •Poor, shoddy; less than second-rate.He was smoking a cherry-wood pipe, and looked on the whole as if he had borrowed his outfit from the wardrobe of a third-rate dramatic company. — 1913 •(UK, historical) Of a Royal Navy ship of the line in the Napoleonic Era: having 64–80 guns across two gun decks, a complement of 500–650, and weighing approximately 1,750 tons burthen. noun1 •(UK, historical) A third-rate ship of the line. formsthird rates · third-rates
