Obs. Forms: 5–7 catour, -tor, -ter, (5 -tore, -tur(e, kator, -tour, 6 kater). [ME. catour, aphetic form of acatour, ACATER, q.v. Superseded before 1700 by CATERER.]
A buyer of provisions or ‘cates’; in large households the officer who made the necessary purchases of provisions; a CATERER.
c. 1400. Gamelyn, 321. I am oure Catour [v.r. Catur] and bere oure Alther purse.
1481. Howard Househ. Bks. (1841), 17. My lorde toke to the Kator, for Hossolde, xxvj. s. iiij. d.
1512. MS. Acc. St. John’s Hosp. Canterb., Rec. for iij calvys off þe cater of Crystis Cherche.
1567. Maplet, Gr. Forest, 89. He is as good a meates man and Catour for him selfe as any thing living is.
1587. J. Harmar, trans. Beza’s Serm., 377 (T.). Their Katers, Butlers & Cooks.
1598. Barkcley, Felic. Man, III. (1603), 203. To eate of such a Caters prouision.
1613. Bp. Hall, Holy Panegyr., 29. The glutton makes God his cator, and himselfe the guest.
1621. Quarles, Argalus & P. (1678), 43. Th’impatient fist Of the false Cater.
b. transf. and fig. = ‘Purveyor.’
c. 1430. Lydgate, Bochas, VII. x. 19 (1558), 161 b. Of his diete catour was scarsite.
1590. Greene, Mourn. Garm., 28. The eye is loues Cator.
1612. R. Carpenter, Soules Sent., 27. The very elements themselues by burning, infecting, drowning, and swallowing many, becomming caters for our corruption.
1665. Boyle, Occas. Refl. (1675), 49. Many of the Beasts, and Birds, and Fishes, are but our Caters for one another.
