1. One who cuts wood; one who cuts down or fells trees, or cuts off their branches, for the wood; a wood-hewer.
1774. Pennsylv. Gaz., 14 Dec. Suppl. 3/3, Advt., Cross-cut, pit, hand, woodcutters, tennon, pannel, grafting, and a variety of other saws.
1775. Lynch, in Sparks, Corr. Amer. Rev. (1853), I. 84. Will it be right to keep your heroes for wood-cutters?
1837–42. Hawthorne, Twice-told T. (1851), II. ix. 129. The axe of the woodcutter echoes … in the forest.
1844. Dickens, Mart. Chuz., xxiii. The huts of the wood-cutters, where the vessel stopped for fuel.
2. A maker of woodcuts, a wood-engraver.
1821. T. G. Wainewright, Ess. & Crit. (1880), 194. Our historical wood-cutters have thought it much to follow … those lines ready-pencilled by the inventor on the blocks.
1924. Times Lit. Suppl., 12 June, 365/2. Mr. Maudslay interpreting the stone carvings, and the woodcutters interpreting Mr. Maudslay.
