Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)
Hide Quotations Hide Etymology
About this entry:
First published 1952 (SND Vol. III).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.
CUSTOMER, n. Used attrib. in combs.: 1. customer tailor, a travelling tailor working for private customers; 2. customer wark (work), private orders as opposed to work done for a factory; 3. customer weaver, a weaver who works for private customers. All now only hist.1. Sc. 1909 Colville 188:
All over Old Scotland the “customer” tailor, working for customers, was known as Whip-the-Cat.2. Sc. 1824 R. Chambers Poet. Remains (1883) 18:
Yet canty's the wabster, and blyth as a lark, Whene'er he gets what he ca's customer-wark!Sc. 1832 Chambers's Edb. Jnl. I. 276/4:
When customer work failed, he [the weaver] was fain to work a piece upon speculation.Slk. 1886 T. Craig-Brown Hist. Selkirkshire II. 179:
As yet [1817] there was no factory of any consequence in the town [Selkirk], the weavers for the most part living in poor houses of their own, earning a precarious living from what was called “customer wark.”3. Sc. 1832 Chambers's Edb. Jnl. I. 276/3:
There are now very few customer weavers, as they are called, who can obtain full employment.Sc. 1867 N. Macleod Starling I. ii.:
Ane o' them . . . made a stramash atween . . . our Auld Licht minister, and . . . the Customer Weaver.
You may wish to vary the format shown below depending on the citation style used.
"Customer n.". Dictionary of the Scots Language. 2004. Scottish Language Dictionaries Ltd. Accessed 6 May 2024 <http://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/customer>