affecter
(əˈfɛktə(r))
Also 7–8 affector.
[f. affect v.1 + -er.]
† 1. One who has an affection for, a lover. Obs.
| 1568 C. Watson Polyb. 16 b, I think they were deceyved (as affectoures are accustomed). 1590 Marlowe 1st Pt. Tamburl. v. ii, Madam, your father, and the Arabian King The first affecter of your excellence, Come now. 1622 Heylin Cosmogr. (1682) ii. 178 Famous for Government, affectors of Freedom. 1638 Venner Tobacco (1650) 404 These idle affectors of Tobacco. |
2. A professed adherent or practiser (of anything); an ostentatious or pretentious user, possessor, or professor.
| 1580 2nd & 3rd Blast (1869) 100 A great affecter of that vaine Art of plaie making. 1628 Earle Microcosm. xlii. 93 A great affecter of wits and such prettinesses. 1660 T. Stanley Hist. Philos. (1701) 87/2 Vain affecters of Words, ignorant of those things which they professed. 1723 Bp. O. Blackall Wks. I. 499 Our Saviour was no Affecter of Novelty in Devotion. 1750 Johnson Rambler No. 20 ¶14 The affector of great excellencies. 1830 Coleridge Ch. & St. 168 There are few [charges], if any, that I should be more anxious to avoid than that of being an affecter of paradoxes. |
† 3. absol. An affected person. Obs.
| 1607 P. C. tr. H. Stephen's World of Wonders 238 Neither can these fine finicall affecters alleadge the Italian tongue..to warrant their pronunciation. 1611 Cotgr., Affectateur, an affector; one that (curiously) imitates a fashion, or takes on him a habit, which either becomes or befits him not. |