Also 9 (? erron.) wardour. [See WARDERER.] In early use: A staff or wand. Later, the baton or truncheon carried as a symbol of office, command or authority; esp. as used to give the signal for the commencement or cessation of hostilities in a battle or tournament.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 516/2. Warder, staffe … bacillus … perticulus.
1500. Maldon (Essex) Court Rolls, Bundle 59, No. 3 b. Super quo dictus constabularius eum percussit cum predicto warder.
a. 1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. V., 49 b. Before whom there went … syr Thomas of Herpingham … with a warder in his hand, and when he cast up his warder al the army shouted.
1568. Grafton, Chron., II. 396. The king cast downe his warder and commaunded them to stay.
1643. R. Baker, Chron., Rich. I. (1653), 88. [At the coronation] William de Patricke, Earl of Salisbury … bare the Warder or Rod, having on the top thereof a Dove.
1765. H. Walpole, Castle of Otranto, iii. So saying, the herald cast down his warder.
1813. Scott, Trierm., II. xx. When the strife grows warm,… thy king commands, Thou drop the warder from thy hands.
1824. Meyrick, Ant. Armour, II. 32. At this King Edward threw down his wardour, the marshal cried ‘Ho!’ and the combat ceased.
1898. S. J. Weyman, Shrewsbury, xxxii. (1917), 253. The portrait of a man in armour, with a warder in his mailed hand, frowned down on me.
