Forms: 4 con-, cum-, coum-, comfortour(e, 5 confourtour, (comforthther), 5–6 conforture, 6– comforter. [a. Anglo-Fr. confortour:—OF. conforteor (in nom. confortère):—L. type *confortātōr-em, agent-sb. f. confortāre: see COMFORT v. and -ER.]
1. One who or that which comforts or consoles.
1382. Wyclif, Job xvi. 2. Alle ȝee ben heuye coumfortoures.
c. 1440. Gesta Rom., 119 (Add. MS.). The blissed Virgyn marie, that is conforture of alle desolate.
1576. Fleming, Panoplie Ep., 66. Most unmeete to minister consolation … for that I mee selfe stoode in neede of a comforter.
1610. Shaks., Temp., II. i. 195. It [sleep] sildome visits sorrow, when it doth, it is a Comforter.
1752. Fielding, Amelia, III. ii. The doctor is the best of comforters.
1796. H. Hunter, trans. St.-Pierre’s Stud. Nat. (1799), II. 509. The comforter of the afflicted.
1856. Miss Mulock, J. Halifax, xxxix. She would be to him at once wife and child, plaything and comforter.
b. Theol. A title of the Holy Spirit.
[= OF. confortere(s, -teor, transl. L. consōlātor, a common rendering since 7th c. of Gr. παράκλητος John xiv. 16, etc.), properly = advocatus ‘advocate, intercessor,’ as commonly taken in the early Latin Church. In the Vulgate, Jerome retained the Gr. untranslated as paracletus: see PARACLETE. Isidore, a. 640, says (Orig., VII. iii. 10) ‘Spiritus sanctus, quod dicitur paracletus, a consolatione dicitur … Consolator enim tristibus mittitur … Alii paracletum dicunt Latine oratorem vel advocatum interpretari.’ The Fr. Gloss. de Douai (14th c.) ed. Escallier, has ‘Paraclitus, conforteres.’]
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. XVI. 190. Þe holygoost … confortoure of creatures.
1382. Wyclif, John xiv. 16. I schal preie the fadir, and he schal ȝyue to ȝou another coumfortour.
1450–1530. Myrr. our Ladye, 293. Holy goste conforture of fatherless and motherlesse.
1667. Milton, P. L., XII. 486. Hee to his own a Comforter will send.
1712. Addison, Spect., No. 273, ¶ 9. The whole God-head … under the Three-fold Distinction of a Creator, a Redeemer, and a Comforter!
1827. Keble, Chr. Y., Good Friday ii. 6. Where … The very Comforter in light and love descends.
a. 1875. Monsell, Hymn, ‘When I had wandered.’ My Father, Saviour, Comforter.
c. Job’s comforter: a proverbial phrase for one who intends or professes to comfort, but does the opposite (see Job xvi. 2).
[1680. Hickeringill, Meroz, 29. Those Preachers are like Jobs Comforters.]
1870. Miss Bridgman, R. Lynne, II. iv. 88. She was a veritable Job’s comforter.
1883. Harper’s Mag., Nov., 905/2. Such Job’s comforters as these.
† 2. A small kind of spaniel. Obs.
1577–87. Holinshed, Chron. (1808), I. 387. The spaniell gentle, or comforter.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, II. 186/1. The Spaniel Gentle, or the Comforter, is a little pretty kind of Spaniel, of the least sort, such as Gentle-Women cary in their bosoms.
1790. Bewick, Quadrupeds (1824), 364. The comforter … is generally kept by the ladies as an attendant of the toilette or the drawing-room.
† 3. One who aids, countenances, or abets. (Chiefly a legal term.) Obs.
1483. Cath. Angl., 72. A Comforthther, confortator.
1495. Act 11 Henry VII., c. 64. Pream. Helpers, socourers and comforteris.
1570. Act 13 Eliz., c. 2 § 4. All and every Aiders, Comforters, or Maintainers of the said … Offenders.
† 4. An invigorating agent; a cordial. Obs.
1563. Hyll, Art Garden. (1593), 45. The same comforter, which they name the three Sanders, prepared of the Apothecaries.
5. A thing that produces physical comfort.
1837. W. Irving, Capt. Bonneville, II. 242. A trusty plaid; an old and valued travelling companion and comforter.
1844. Kinglake, Eöthen, xii. The tchibouque—great comforter of those that are hungry and way-worn.
6. A long woolen scarf worn round the throat as a protection from cold.
1833. T. Hook, Widow & Marquess, xii. A green and white net comforter.
1858. R. S. Surtees, Ask Mamma, iii. 8. Divesting himself of a great coarse blue and white worsted comforter.
1863. Ruskin, Pol. Econ. Art, ii. 114. Knitting comforters for her cousins.
b. A quilted coverlet; = COMFORT sb. 8, COMFORTABLE B. 2 c. (U.S.)
1864. Webster, Comforter … 4. A wadded quilt; a comfort. (U.S.)
1878. Mrs. Stowe, Poganuc P., i. 5. With a neat comforter of quilted cotton.
Hence Comfortered ppl. a., wearing a comforter (sense 6).
1867. Annie Edwards, Steven Lawrence (1869), II. xvii. 250. A guard, great-coated, comfortered for his two hundred miles of wintry travelling, called out to the ‘passengers for Chartres, Le Mans, Rennes, Brest,’ to take their places.
1880. Miss Broughton, Sec. Th., I. v. A few ulstered, comfortered men … waiting for the night mail.
