gilder
nounUK /ˈɡɪldə/ · US /ˈɡɪldɚ/
Etymology From Middle English gilder (“gilder; goldsmith”) [and other forms], from gilden (“to cover with gilding, gild; to decorate with gold”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰelh₃- (“green, yellow”)) + -er, -ere (suffix forming agent nouns, especially the names of persons engaged in professions or trades); analysable as gild + -er.
1
One who gilds; especially one whose occupation is to overlay things with gold.
- A lady ſhould, indeed, ſtudie her face, when wee thinke ſhee ſleepes: nor, when the dores are ſhut, ſhould men bee inquiring, all is ſacred within, then. [...] you ſee guilders will not worke, but inclos'd. They muſt not diſcouer, how little ſerues, with the helpe of art, to adorne a great deale.1609 December (first performance), Beniamin Ionson [i.e., Ben Jonson], “Epicoene, or The Silent Woman. A Comœdie. […]”, in The Workes of Beniamin Ionson (First Folio), London: […] Will[iam] Stansby, published 1616, →OCLC, Act I, scene i, page 532:
- The leather gilders lay a Couch of water and whites of eggs on the leather, before they apply the leaf gold or ſilver.1735, [John Barrow], “COUCH”, in Dictionarium Polygraphicum: Or, The Whole Body of Arts Regularly Digested. […], volume I (A–H), London: […] C[harles] Hitch and C[harles] Davis […], and S[amuel] Austen […], →OCLC:
4 more examples
- Gilding in oil, or oily ſize, is uſed for domes, roofs of churches, ſtatues that are to ſtand in the weather, &c. For this purpoſe the Engliſh gilders generally adopt a gold ſize, made of yellow oker ground fine with water, and dried on a chalk ſtone, then ground up with a proper quantity of drying oil, to give it the ſtiffneſs required.1767, Thomas Mortimer, “GILDER”, in A New and Complete Dictionary of Trade and Commerce: […], volume II, London: Printed for the author; and sold by S. Crowder, […]; and J. Coote, […]; and J. Fletcher, […], →OCLC, column 2:
- He was a painter and gilder. [...] Now could the poor gilder no longer get paid by his employers.1810 January, “O.” [pseudonym], “Remarkable Benevolence”, in The Christian’s Magazine: Designed to Promote the Knowledge and Influence of Evangelical Truth and Order, volume III, number I, New York, N.Y.: Published by Williams and Whiting, […]; J. Seymour, printer, →OCLC, page 29:
- A carriage, for example, was formerly the product of the labour of a great number of independent artificers, such as wheelwrights, harness-makers, tailors, locksmiths, upholsterers, turners, fringe-makers, glaziers, painters, polishers, gilders, &c. [...] [I]f a number of carriages are being made simultaneously, some may be in the hands of the gilders while others are going through an earlier process.1887, Karl Marx, “Division of Labour and Manufacture”, in Samuel Moore and Edward Aveling, transl., edited by Frederick [i.e., Friedrich] Engels, Capital: A Critical Analysis of Capitalist Production: Translated from the Third German Edition, volume I, London: Swan Sonnenschein, Lowrey, & Co., […], →OCLC, part IV (Production of Relative Surplus-value), section 1 (Twofold Origin of Manufacture), page 327:
- Charles Shaw was born in Tunstall, in the Potteries, in 1832, the son of a skilled painter and gilder in the pottery trade who lost this well-paid job through victimization after a strike.1974, “An Old Potter”, in John Burnett, editor, Useful Toil: Autobiographies of Working People from the 1820s to the 1920s, London: Allen Lane, →ISBN; republished London; New York, N.Y.: Routledge, 1994, →ISBN, part III (Skilled Workers), page 303:
- Derived terms
- book-edge gilder