townsman vs occupant

townsman and occupant both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
townsman	Yes	No	No	No
occupant	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, occupant is a hypernym of townsman; that is, occupant is a word with a broader meaning than townsman:

townsman: a resident of a town or city
occupant: someone who lives at a particular place for a prolonged period or who was born there

Other hypernyms of townsman include occupier, resident.

townsman (noun)	occupant (noun)
a person from the same town as yourself	someone who lives at a particular place for a prolonged period or who was born there
a resident of a town or city