assessor
(əˈsɛsə(r))
Also 4–7 -sour, 5 accessour.
[a. OF. assessour (mod. assesseur), cogn. with Pr. assessor, Sp. asesor, It. assessore:—L. assessōr-em (in cl. L.) an assistant-judge, (in late L.) one who assesses taxes, n. of agent f. assidēre: see assess v. and -or.]
1. One who sits beside; hence, one who shares another's position, rank, or dignity.
| 1667 Milton P.L. vi. 670 Whence to his Son, Th' Assessor of his Throne, he thus began. 1701 W. Wotton Hist. Rome (Commod.) i. 186 Gone up to Heaven, to be a Companion and an Assessor with the Gods. 1842 De Quincey Philos. Herodot. Wks. IX. 211 He justifies his majestic station as a brotherly assessor on the same throne with Homer. |
2. One who sits as assistant or adviser to a judge or magistrate; esp. a skilled assistant competent to advise on technical points of law, commercial usage, navigation, etc. (The earliest sense in Eng.)
| c 1380 Wyclif Wks. (1880) 33 Newe religious assessours of þes vnkunnynge worldely prelatis. 1413 Lydgate Pylgr. Sowle i. xi. 8 Come to oure jugementes, to here and to see as assessours, that ryght be performed. 1496 Dives & Paup. (W. de W.) v. xviii. 220/2 The Juge, the aduocate, the accessour. 1636 Featly Clavis Myst. ix. 113 How religious then ought Judges to be, who are Almighty God's assessours. 1756 Nugent Gr. Tour I. 102 He has his assessors who sit with him, when there are any complaints to be heard. 1810 Bentham Packing (1821) 6 The body of unlearned assessors, termed Jurors or Jurymen. 1883 Law Times 20 Oct. 409/1 The court on the trial of a patent case may call in the aid of a specially qualified assessor. |
3. a. One who assesses taxes. b. One who officially estimates the value of property or income for purposes of taxation.
| 1611 Cotgr., Tauxeur, a rater, taxer, assessor. a 1618 Raleigh Arts of Empire 63 (T.) The assessors of taxes may be elected of the meaner sort of the people. 1835 Reeve De Tocqueville's Democr. Amer. I. v. 119 In New England the assessor fixes the rate of taxes. 1852 M{supc}Culloch Taxation i. iv. 37 The assessors having no means of learning whether individuals have 130l., 140l., or 150l. a year. |
4. transf. or fig. in prec. senses.
| 1625 Hart Anat. Ur. i. ii. 21 Other accidents..are called..assessors or assistants to the disease. 1722 Wollaston Relig. Nat. ix. 173 Bodily inclinations and passions [where reason] allows them to be as it were assessors to it upon the throne, are of admirable use in life. 1841 De Quincey Homer Wks. VI. 350 Pisistratus summoned seventy men of letters..as critical assessors upon these poems. |