Definition:
: a student at a military school who is preparing to be an officer
About the Word:
There is nothing to suggest that the people who invented the English language (whoever they are) had any animus towards cadets, but it is still puzzling that the term for this aspiring officer should have come from a word meaning 'small head'. Cadet comes to English from the French word capdet, which is itself descended from the Late Latin capitellum (which is the aforementioned word meaning 'small head'). Make of it what you will.
Example:
"When Inger-Johanna with impetuosity rushed to the defense of Grip, she saw in him only the son of the idiotic 'cadet of Lurleiken,' as he is called, one of the well-known, amusing figures of the country." — Jonas Lie, in The Granite Monthly, 1894
