▪ I. blotter
(ˈblɒtə(r))
[f. as prec. + -er1.]
1. One who, or that which, blots. a. A scribbler, a sorry writer; b. One who stains or defiles; c. blotter out: a quencher, extinguisher, annihilator.
1601 Cornwallyes Ess. xv, These blotters of paper. a 1631 Harsnet Serm. in Stuart's Serm. (1656) 131 (L.) Thou tookest the blotting of Thine image in Paradise as a blemish to Thyself; and Thou saidst to the blotter, Because thou hast done it, on thy belly shalt thou creep. 1827 Hood Hero & L. lxxxiv, Blank Oblivion—Blotter-out of light. |
2. A thing used for drying wet ink-marks, as a piece of blotting-paper or a blotting-pad.
1591 Percivall Sp. Dict., Borrador, a blotter, a blotting paper. 1859 R. Burton Centr. Afr. in Jrnl. Geogr. Soc. XXIX. 78 Paper—soft and soppy by the loss of glazing—acts as a blotter. 1884 Boston Lit. World 19 Apr. 132/2 His pen spluttered..and he used no blotter. |
3. ‘A term applied in counting-houses to a waste-book’ (Craig 1847); also to a rough copy of a letter.
4. A record of arrests and charges in a police office; a charge-sheet; also gen. a record-book or list. U.S.
1887 Harper's Mag. Mar. 500/2 Every item of police duty, and of civil or criminal occurrence, is inscribed on the ‘blotter’. 1906 Atlantic Monthly Feb. 264 It was necessary..to examine the day-book or blotter in the chief clerk's office [at the Patent Office]. 1910 Washington Times 14 Dec. 1 Three more additions were made yesterday to the hospital blotters. 1926 J. Black You can't Win xix. 299, I never put his name, which is my name, on a police blotter or a prison register while he was alive. 1965 ‘R. L. Pike’ (title) Police blotter. |
▪ II. blotter
obs. form of blatter v.