doer
(ˈduːə(r))
Also 4–6 doar, 5 doere, 6 dowar(e, 6–7 dooer.
[f. do v. + -er1.]
1. One who does; one who performs some act or deed; an actor, agent.
| 13.. Cursor M. 28773 (Cott. G.) Els vnmedeful es þe dede, and makes to þe doer no mede. 1382 Wyclif Jas. i. 22 Be ȝe doers of the word and not herers oneli. 1561 T. Hoby tr. Castiglione's Courtyer i. G iij, In peincting..they are all most excellent dooers. 1594 Shakes. Rich. III, i. iii. 352 Talkers are no good dooers. 1623 Cockeram, Actresse, a woman-doer. 1738 Swift Pol. Conversat. 89 Ill Doers are ill Deemers. 1832 H. Martineau Weal or W. iii. 28 Sympathy affords great advantage to the doers of mischief. |
2. One who acts on behalf of another; an agent, factor, manager; an attorney. Now only Sc.
| 1465 MS. in Tytler Hist. Scot. (1864) II. 388 He sal warn the saidis lord kennedy and Sir Alexander, or yair doars. 1566 Act 8 Eliz. c. 7 §2 No maner [other] person or persons..shall..exercyse or frequent the sayd trade..nor have any Factor or Doer for hym or them in the same. 1721 Wodrow Corr. II. 603, I had the eleven pounds from the Earl of Kilmarnock's doer. 1752 J. Louthian Form of Process (ed. 2) 44 Before the Day of Compearance, the Lord Advocate, or his Depute, give in the Indictment..to the Clerk of Court, that the Prisoner's Doer may have an Opportunity of seeing the same. 1870 Ramsay Remin. vi. (ed. 18) 232 In Scotland it is usual to term the law-agent or man of business of any party his ‘doer’. 1893 Stevenson Catr. 97 I'm doer for Appin and for James of the Glens. |
3. (with qualifying adj.) A horse or other animal that ‘does’ or thrives (well or ill): see do v. 18.
| 1865 Even. Standard 6 Mar., He..is a rare doer, never having been sick nor sorry since the week he was foaled. |
4. slang. One who ‘does’ or cheats another.
| 1840 New Monthly Mag. LIX. 47 [School Masters] are not merely ‘do-the-boys’, but regular doers of their parents. 1862 A. K. H. Boyd Recreat. Country Parson 114 The trickster has been tricked—the doer done. |
5. An eccentric, a ‘character’, esp. in phr. hard doer, a ‘hard case’. Austral. and N.Z.
| a 1885 in Penguin Bk. Austral. Ballads (1964) 78 Many more hard doers, all gone to Kingdom Come. 1916 ‘Anzac’ On Anzac Trail 122 He is a rule, a ‘hard doer’. 1919 Downing Digger Dial. 19 Doer, a person unusually humorous, reckless, undisciplined, immoral or eccentric. 1928 Bulletin (Sydney) 29 Feb. 21/1 Give me the real hard-doer, give me the decent chap. 1929 K. S. Prichard Coonardoo xxxi. 300 You know Monty,..one of the hardest doers in the Nor'-West. 1947 Landfall I. 166 Struth..a real hard doer! 1959 S. H. Courtier Death in Dream Time iii. 28 Laurie could have been joking. He was that kind of doer, you know. |