laugher
nounUK /ˈlɑːfə/ · US /ˈlæfɚ/
Etymology From Middle English lawȝar, lawher(e); equivalent to laugh + -er.
1
One who laughs.
- Well then—if I must neither stir out of the gate nor look out at window, I will at least see what the inside of the house contains that may help to pass away one’s time—peradventure, I may light on that blue-eyed laugher in some corner or other.1820, [Walter Scott], chapter XII, in The Abbot. […], volume I, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne & Co.] for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and for Archibald Constable and Company, and John Ballantyne, […], →OCLC, page 251:
- He and his companions[…] were exchanging jokes with that sort of ostentatious laughter which implies a desire to prove that the laugher is not mortified though some people might suspect it.1862 July – 1863 August, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], “At the Barber’s Shop”, in Romola. […], volume II, London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], published 1863, →OCLC, book III, page 309:
1 more example
- These are the people whose laughter you hear after the boffolas on shows that have been filmed without audiences. I don't suppose all these laughers are dead, but a lot of them must be by this time.1992, Jib Fowles, Why Viewers Watch: A Reappraisal of Television's Effects, page 119:
2
A game in which an opponent is defeated by a sizable margin; a blowout.
3
A variety of the domestic pigeon.
- Related terms
- laugh, laughingly, laughter