▪ I. mazard, n.1
(ˈmæzəd)
Also 7 mazerd, 7–9 mazzard.
[app. an alteration of mazer, by association of the ending with the suffix -ard.]
† 1. A mazer; a cup, bowl, drinking vessel. Also attrib. Obs.
| 1601 W. Fulbecke 1st Pt. Parall. 86 The Bæotians did giue..Bacchus his mazard with a cluster of grapes. 1632 Proc. Star Chamb. (Camden) 303 In Salisbury they have digged up an old Bishop out of his grave and have made a mazzard of his scull. 1696 Aubrey Misc. (1857) 213 They..drank good ale in a brown mazard. |
2. jocular. arch. a. The head.
| 1602 Shakes. Ham. v. i. 97 Knockt about the Mazard with a Sextons Spade. 1621 Molle Camerar. Liv. Libr. v. xiv. 376 Certaine young men, hauing their mazerds well heated with drinking. 1624 Middleton Game at Chess iii. i. 306 The red hat, fit for the guilty mazzard. 1709 Brit. Apollo II. No. 39. 3/1 A..Fellow..takes me o'er the Mazard. 1876 Browning Pacchiarotto iv, With fancy he ran no hazard: Fact might knock him o'er the mazard. |
b. The face, countenance, ‘phiz’.
| 1762–71 H. Walpole Vertue's Anecd. Paint. (1786) IV. 103 His countenance harmonized with his humour, and Christian's mazard was a constant joke. 1820 Moore Fables ii. 82 In vain the Court, aware of errors In all the old established mazards, Prohibited the use of mirrors, And tried to break them at all hazards. |
3. slang. (Anglo-Irish.) The ‘head’ of a coin.
| 1802 M. Edgeworth Irish Bulls 129 ‘Music!’ says he—‘Skull!’ says I—and down they come three brown mazzards. |
Hence † mazard v. trans., to knock on the head.
| a 1616 B. Jonson Love Restored, The rogues let a huge trap-dore fall o' my head. If I had not been a spirit, I had been mazarded. |
▪ II. mazard, n.2 dial.
(ˈmæzəd)
Forms: 6–7 mazar, mazer, 7 massard, 7– maz(z)ard.
[Of obscure origin: possibly a use of prec.]
In the s.w. counties, a kind of small black cherry; in some other localities applied to the wild cherry; also attrib. as mazard cherry.
| 1578 Lyte Dodoens vi. I. 723 The common small Cherries, or Mazars. 1579 Langham Gard. Health (1633) 136 The gumme of the mazer or wilde Cherytree. c 1630 Risdon Surv. Devon §322 (1810) 332 A fruit, called mazards here, elsewhere black cherries. 1676 Lady A. Fanshawe Mem. (1830) 70 They have, near this town [Barnstaple], a fruit called a massard, like a cherry, but different in taste. 1782 M. Cutler in Life, etc. (1888) I. 90 Set out some mazzard cherries I brought from Mr. Balch's, at Newbury. 1790 Grose Prov. Gloss. (ed. 2), Mazards, black cherries. Glouc. 1855 Kingsley Westw. Ho! i, ‘Red quarrenders’ and mazard cherries. |