trespasser
(ˈtrɛspəsə(r))
Forms: 4–5 trespasour, 4–6 -passour, -oure, 5 -pasor, -owre, -passor, 5–6 -pacer, 6 -passar, 6– trespasser.
[ME. a. AF. trespassour = OF. trespasseor, agent-n. of trespasser to trespass.]
One who trespasses.
1. A transgressor, a law-breaker; a wrong-doer, sinner, offender.
| [1292 Britton i. xxi. §11 Touz trespassours encountre la forme de nos estatuz.] 1362 Langl. P. Pl. A. i. 94 And take trespassours and teiȝen hem faste. 1387 Trevisa Higden (Rolls) VII. 117 Of þe whiche statut þe firste trespasour was þe erle. 1450–1530 Myrr. our Ladye 75 And forgyue vs oure trespasses, as we forgyue oure trespassoures. 1535 Coverdale Josh. vii. heading, The trespacer is stoned vnto death. 1648 Petit. East. Assoc. 26 We see no reason, why..our Trespassers be our Judges. 1742 J. Glas Lord's Supper v. vi. 234 The Trespasser humbles himself to confess his Fault. |
2. Law. One who commits a trespass;
esp. one who trespasses on the lands of another.
| c 1455 Forest Lawis c. 22 in Acts Parl. Scot. (1844) I. 692 Item gif ony wylde best be fundyn dede or wondyt and þe trespassour be nocht fundyn, at þe next mut þar aw to be inquisicioun made. 1590 Swinburne Testaments 237 Whosoeuer as a meere trespasser, entereth into the goods of the testator. 1651 G. W. tr. Cowel's Inst. 231 The party following them [stray beasts], and endeavouring to keep them from committing Damages, is no Trespasser. 1700 Tyrrell Hist. Eng. II. 1108 Concerning Trespassers in Parks. 1837 Dickens Pickw. xix, Remind me to have a board done about trespassers, and spring guns, and all that sort of thing, to keep the common people out. 1895 Pollock & Maitland Hist. Eng. Law II. 166 The man who has bought or hired goods from a trespasser, how has he broken the king's peace and why should he be sent to gaol? |
| fig. 1702 North Let. 6 Dec., in Lives (1890) III. App. 247 If I am too much a trespasser on your better time. |
† 3. Rhet. lit. ‘That which oversteps or passes beyond’; hyperbaton.
Obs. rare—1.
| 1589 Puttenham Eng. Poesie iii. xii. (Arb.) 180 To all their speaches which wrought by disorder the Greekes gaue a general name (Hiperbaton) as much to say as the (trespasser). |