▪ I. swiller1
(ˈswɪlə(r))
[f. swill v. + -er1.]
One who swills.
† 1. One who swills dishes; a scullion. Obs.
| c 1475 Pict. Voc. in Wr.-Wülcker 769/24 Hic lixa, a swyllere. |
2. One who drinks greedily or to excess.
| 1598 Florio, Sorbibruodo, a greasie, slouenly feeder, a sipper of broth, a swiller. c 1618 Moryson Itin. iv. (1903) 224 These Judges were..great swillers of Spanish sacke. 1694 Motteux Rabelais v. Prol. A 6 b, What Swillers, what Twisters will there be! 1845 Ford Handbk. Spain i. 71 The genuine Goths, as happens everywhere to this day, were great swillers of ale and beer. |
▪ II. swiller2 north. dial.
[f. swill n.1 + -er1.]
One who makes swills or baskets.
| 1859 W. Dickinson Gloss. Words & Phrases Cumberland 116 Swiller,..a swill-maker. 1901 C. W. Bardsley Dict. Eng. & Welsh Surnames 522/2 In Ulverston registers to this day a maker of swills (i.e. baskets) is set down as a swiller. 1949 K. S. Woods Rural Crafts of Eng. iii. viii. 142 In Furness the baskets are known as swills, and the craftsmen as swillers. Whether the word is a form of scull or scuttle, or whether it means swaler, is not known. 1972 Daily Tel. 5 Aug. 9/4 The Lancashire mountains near Ulverston, home of the ‘swillers’, or basket-makers. Ibid., With a short and very sharp knife the swiller slices his oak into ribs which he fixes across a hazel rim. |