Forms: 3–5 celer(e, 4–6 seler, 4–7 celler, (5 celar), 5–7 seller, 6–7 sellar, (7 sellor), 7– cellar. [ME. celer, a. Anglo-F. celer, OF. celier (mod.F. cellier):—L. cellārium set of cells, receptacle for food, f. cella CELL.]
† 1. A store-house or store-room, whether above or below ground, for provisions; a granary, buttery or pantry. Obs. exc. dial. in fish-cellar; see quot. 1848; cf. also coal-cellar, wine-cellar.
a. 1225. Ancr. R., 214. He stikeð euer iðe celere, oðer iðe kuchene.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 4676. Siþen commanded [ioseph] him-selue Depe selers for to delue.
a. 1340. Hampole, Psalter cxliii. 15. Þaire celers ful riftand.
c. 1375. O. E. Prayers, in Rel. Ant., I. 40. The kyng hath lad me in to a wyn-celer.
1382. Wyclif, Luke xii. 24. Biholde ȝe crowis … to whiche is no celer, nether beerne, and God fedith hem.
c. 1420. Liber Cocorum (1862), 33. Kepe hit fro ayre … In cofer, or huche or seler merke.
1483. Cath. Angl., 56. A Celler, cellarium … & cetera; vbi a butry.
1483. Caxton, Esope, 2 b. He fonde the celer open … and hath eten al the fygges.
c. 1535. Dewes, Introd. Fr., in Palsgr., 1031. Brynge this gentilman to the seller & make him good chere.
1598. Florio, Cella … a seller or butterie.
1663. Cowley, Verses & Ess. (1669), 131. Sellars and Granaries in vain we fill, With all the bounteous Summers store.
1848. C. A. Johns, Week at Lizard, 41. Here is a fish-cellar … a place for salting, keeping, and storing away pilchards.
† b. fig. Obs.
a. 1340. Hampole, Psalter lv. 12. Of þe awtere of my hert and þe celere of my consyens cumes all þat i kyndel in þi luf.
1387. Trevisa, Higden (Rolls), I. 77. Paradys … was þe celer and place of all fairenesse.
1480. Cambriæ Epit., 64, in Map’s Poems (1841), App. God … Made that lond … To be selere of all hele.
1565. Jewel, Repl. Harding (1611), 393. A man … being brought by God into his inward cellers, may from thence obtaine the true vnderstanding, and interpretation of the Holy Scriptures.
2. An underground room or vault.
This sense occurs contextually in some of the earlier quots.; it is impossible to determine at what period the notion of ‘store-room’ began to give place to that of ‘underground chamber.’ Cotgr. 1611 has it as the transl. of Fr. cave, and Minsheu 1617 gives as its equivalents Fr. cave and Lat. hypogæum.
[1331. Literæ Cantuar. (Rolls), I. 400. Nostre celer de nostre novele meson de piere en Chepe.]
c. 1330. R. Brunne, Chron. Wace (Rolls.), 2068. In Londone he dide hure kepe Vnder erthe in a seler depe.
c. 1450. Merlin, 125. In roches or in seleres under erthe.
1583. Stubbes, Anat. Abus., II. 29. In a moyst seller, vnderneath the grounde.
1633. T. Stafford, Pac. Hib., viii. (1821), 572. They were constrayned to retyre into the Sellors.
1787. T. Jefferson, Corr. (1830), 123. A fine piece of mosaic, still on its bed, forms the floor of a cellar.
1873. Morley, Rousseau, I. 41. After … six weeks … passed in the garret or cellar of his rude patroness.
1877. Bryant, Song of Tower, vii. In … the damp cellar’s stifling air.
† b. transf. Applied to the grave. Obs.
c. 1550. Lacy, Wyl Bucke’s Test. I bequeth mi body to the colde seler.
c. With defining words prefixed, as beer-, coal-, wine-cellar, which see under their initial element.
3. Often for wine-cellar; hence transf. the contents of the wine-cellar, a person’s stock of wines.
1541. Act 33 Hen. VIII., c. 12 § 10. The sergeant of the sellar … shall also be than and there redy with a pot of redde wine.
1610. Shaks., Temp., II. ii. 137. My Cellar is in a rocke by th’ sea-side.
1706–7. Farquhar, Beaux’ Strat., I. i. I have now in my Cellar Ten Tun of the best Ale in Staffordshire.
1841. Emerson, Lect. Conserv., Wks. (Bohn), II. 274. O conservatism! your pantry is full of meats and your cellar of wines.
Mod. He gives very good dinners, but I don’t think much of his cellar.
† 4. A box, a case; esp. for holding bottles; a case of bottles. (For SALT-CELLAR Cf. SALER, of which -cellar is a corruption.) Obs.
1632. B. Jonson, Magn. Lady, III. i. (1640), 32 (D.). Run for the cellar of strong waters, quickly.
1627. Capt. Smith, Seaman’s Gram., xiii. 61. Boy fetch my cellar of bottles.
1667. Pepys, Diary, 1 April. His wife afterwards did … give me a cellar of waters of her own distilling.
¶ 5. for SOLER, upper-room.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 15208. He þam lent … A celer in at ete.
1432–50. trans. Higden (Rolls), III. 285. Goenge to a hie parte of the seller [solarii] or chamber.
6. attrib. and Comb., as cellar-bin, -door, -keeper, etc.; cellarless adj.; also cellar-book, a book containing an account of the stock of wines, etc., in a cellar; cellar-flap, a flap on hinges, level with the surface of the ground, opening into a cellar; cellar-kitchen, a kitchen below the ground-floor, a basement kitchen; cellar-physic, wine; cellar-plate, an iron plate in the pavement covering the entrance-hole of a coal-cellar; cellar-slug, a large striped slug found in cellars; cellar-way, a passage through, or as if through, cellars.
1883. G. Lloyd, Ebb & Flow, I. 2. Its *cellar-bins—some one else’s patent.
1848. Thackeray, Van. Fair, xxiv. (O.). He … overhauled the butler’s *cellar-book.
1684. Gt. Frost (1844), 14. Their carelessly leaving open *sellar door.
1697. C’tess. D’Aunoy’s Trav. (1706), 193. It is as big as a Cellar-door Key.
1884. T. W. Hime, Public Health, 57. Prohibition of occupying of *Cellar Dwellings.
1883. Daily News, 10 Jan., 6/7. Injuries received … in falling over the *cellar-flap.
1591. Percivall, Sp. Dict., Cillero, a *celler-keeper.
1864. E. Burritt, Walk Lond. to John O’Groat’s, 310. All the damp, low, *cellarless cottages.
1793. J. Beresford, in Looker-on, No. 54. Cow-heel and such *cellar-messes.
1697. Dampier, Voy. (1729), I. 542. Fine Air … good Kitchin and *Cellar Physick.
1881. Daily News, 22 April, 2/6. The defendant was legally liable in having his *cellar plate unfastened.
1882. Garden, 30 Dec., 579/2. A fine example of the *cellar slug.
1867. Howells, Ital. Journ., 47. The effect of the buildings vaulted above the sidewalks is that of a continuous *cellarway.
