‖ gens de (la) robe, n. pl.
(ʒɑ̃ də la rɔb)
[Fr., lit. ‘men of the (long) robe’.]
Lawyers.
| 1679 H. Savile Let. 5 June in Savile Correspondence (Camden Soc., 1858) 93 All Protestants are turn'd out of all places except just the gens de robe. 1850 C. M. Yonge Kenneth xxii. 272 His own future..arrayed itself..in sombre colours, as regarding English lawyers, with all a young French soldier's contempt for the gens de la robe. 1886 Athenæum 10 July 47/2 Henri de Mesmes..was one of not a few gens de robe of whom L'Hôpital is the best known. 1967 L. Norton tr. Mem. St. Simon ix. 130 The gens de la robe (men of the long robe) were despised because they sold their services to the state for money. |