Landman

[OE. landmann, f. land LAND sb. + mann MAN sb. Cf. MHG. lantman native, mod.G. landmann, Du. landman countryman, peasant, farmer. Cf. LANDSMAN.]

  † 1.  A man of a (specified or indicated) country. = COUNTRYMAN 1. Obs. rare.

a. 1000.  Cædmon’s Exod., 179 (Gr.). Feond onseʓon laðum eaʓan landmanna cyme.

c. 1000.  Ordil Dunsæte, c. 6, in Schmid, Gesetze, 360.

1641.  Milton, Ch. Govt., I. vii. 29. The Englishman of many other nations is least atheisticall…; but … he may fall not unlikely sometimes as any other land man into an uncouth opinion.

  2.  A countryman, peasant.

  (In Carlyle, after G. landmann.)

c. 1300.  Cursor M., 28072. Nu sal i tell þe … Hu þu sal sceu þi scrift to preist,… Þat landmen mai sumquat lere, To scape þair scrift wit þis samplere. Ibid., 29411. Quen he [a clerk] chaunges crun or wede, And funden [es] in land mans dede.

1497.  Extracts Aberd. Reg. (1844), I. 60. That euere burges sal inbring certaine landmen, out duellaris … to remane within the tone. Ibid. (1543), 191. The toune is hauely murmurit be the landmen.

1825.  Carlyle, Schiller, III. (1845), 215. They are no philosophers or tribunes, but frank, stalwart landmen.

  3.  = LANDSMAN 2. Now rare or Obs.

1480.  Howard Househ. Bks. (Roxb.), 9. iij. M. men, lande men and maryners … arrayed for the werre.

1606.  Shaks., Ant. & Cl., IV. iii. 11. If tomorrow Our Nauie thriue, I haue an absolute hope Our Landmen will stand vp.

1664.  J. Keymor, Dutch Fish., 6. Thus they make their Landmen Seamen, their Seamen Fishermen, their Fishermen Mariners.

1752.  Fielding, Amelia, III. iv. What inspires a landman with the highest apprehension of danger gives not the least concern to a sailor.

1769.  De Foe’s Tour Gt. Brit. (ed. 7), II. 129. The Distinction between Landmen and Seamen on board, which used to create Animosity, and subject the Landmen to some Hardships.

1808.  G. Edwards, Pract. Plan, i. 7. The facility with which these convert landmen into sailors.

1846.  Whately, Addit. Elem. Rhet., 3. Nautical terms … it is little loss to a landman to be ignorant of.

  † 4.  A man having landed property. Obs.

1562.  A. Scott, Poems (S.T.S.), i. 156. But kirkmennis cursit substance semis sweit Till landmen, w^t þat leud burd lyme are lyttit.

1670.  Blount, Law Dict. (1691), Landman, the Terre-tenant.

1708.  J. Chamberlayne, St. Gt. Brit., II. III. iii. (1737), 405. A Gentleman of three Generations claims Precedency from any ordinary Land-man, who has but newly acquired his Lands.