Also 5 waaffery, 6 wafrie, waferye, weffrey, wafarie, 7 wayfary. [a. AF. wafrie, f. wafre WAFER sb.]
1. A room or building in which wafers or thin cakes are made; the department of the royal household occupied with the making of wafers. Also † wafery-house.
1455. Househ. Hen. VI., in Househ. Ord. (1790), *22. The waaffery—William Overton, Yoman, [etc.].
1553. in Archæologia, XII. 362. The Waferye. Adam Alee, yeoman.
a. 1558. in Gutch, Collect. Cur. (1781), II. 1. Item, flore for the pastre, and wafery, and seller, as nedithe.
a. 1562. G. Cavendish, Wolsey (1893), 24. In the chaundrye, iii persons: in the wafery, ii.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, III. 43/2. Officers and Servants in the Kings Majesties Houshold…. The Waffrey-House. Yeoman,… Groom,… [etc.]. Ibid., IV. xii. (Roxb.), 499/2. Then followed the Groomes of … The Wafery.
1826. Hor. Smith, Tor Hill (1838), II. 271. Not unless you come to him from the wafery, the pantry, the cellerage … or the larder.
1830. Nicolas, in Priv. Purse Exp. Eliz. York, 229/1. The Wafery … still is one of the offices of the royal house-hold.
† 2. Wafers collectively, light pastry: Obs.
1542. Udall, Erasm. Apoph., 170 b. He … bidde theim to kepe a corner of their stomakes for the tartes, wafrie, and iounkettes, that wer to bee serued … after the meate.
