Larder¹

Forms: 4, 7 lardere, 5, 7 lardre, 5 lardar, -yr(e, -ure, laardere, lardder, larddre, (6 lawder), 7 Sc. lairder, 4– larder. [a. OF. lardier, AF. larder:—med.L. lardārium, f. lardum LARD sb. Cf. OF. lardoir, lardouer ‘garde-manger.’]

  1.  A room or closet in which meat (? orig. bacon) and other provisions are stored.

c. 1305.  St. Kenelm, 236, in E. E. P. (1862), 54. Þeȝ his larder were neȝ ido & his somer lese lene.

c. 1330.  R. Brunne, Chron. (1810), 28. Alle Northwales he set to treuage hie. Tuenti pounde of gold be ȝere … & þer to fyue hundreth kie ilk ȝere to his lardere.

c. 1340.  Cursor M., 4688 (Trin.). Moo þen a þousande seleres Filled he wiþ wynes … And larderes [Gött. lardineris] wiþ salt flesshe.

1390–1.  Earl Derby’s Exped. (Camden), 60. Pro ligno et clauis per ipsum emptis ibidem pro la lardre.

c. 1440.  Promp. Parv., 288/1. Laardere, lardarium.

1468–9.  Durham Acc. Rolls (Surtees), 92. 1 axe pro le lardar.

1541.  Act 33 Hen. VIII., c. 12 § 13. The serieant of the larder for the time being of the same household.

1567.  Maplet, Gr. Forest, 105. Espying hir time when and how she may come to the Lawder or Vittailehouse.

1613.  Shaks., Hen. VIII., V. iv. 5. Good M. Porter I belong to th’ Larder.

1644.  D. Hume, Hist. Douglas, 28. This Cellar is called yet the Douglas Lairder [cf. LARDINER 1. 1375].

1768–74.  Tucker, Lt. Nat. (1834), I. 378. The hen gratifies her desires in hatching and breeding up chickens for the larder.

1784.  Cowper, Task, II. 615. Dress drains our cellar dry, And keeps our larder lean.

1838.  Prescott, Ferd. & Is. (1846), III. xx. 206. The larders of Savona were filled with the choicest game.

1858.  R. S. Surtees, Ask Mamma, lxx. 311. The whole repast bespoke the exhausted larder peculiar to the end of the week.

1877.  Mrs. Forrester, Mignon, I. 50. Utterly unmindful of the probable condition of the larder at home.

  b.  transf. and fig. Something serving as a storehouse.

1623.  Lisle, Ælfric on O. & N. Test., Ded. 34. Forth, Taw, Cluyd, Tems, Severne, Humber, Trent, And foure great Seas, your Larders be for Lent.

1864.  W. Wilberforce, in J. S. Harford, Recoll., 195. It [the antediluvian mammoth] had only been hanging in Nature’s larder for the last five thousand years.

1877.  Mrs. Oliphant, Makers Flor., viii. 220. His table became the larder and patrimony of the poor.

  † 2.  fig. Chiefly in phr. to make larder of: to turn into meat for the larder; to bring to the slaughter-house, hence, to slaughter; to larder, to the slaughter-house. Also occas. simply = slaughter. Obs.

a. 1330.  Otuel, 1129. Al the Kinges ost … maden a foul larder.

a. 1340.  Hampole, Psalter lxxxii. 10. Zebee, that is, swilke þat þe deuyl makis his lardere of.

c. 1380.  Wyclif, Eng. Wks. (1880), 251. Prelatis courtis þat ben dennys of þeues & larderis of helle.

1387–8.  T. Usk, Test. Love, II. xiv. (Skeat), l. 13. Thus drawen was this innocente, as an oxe to the larder.

1390.  Gower, Conf., III. 124. Than [in November] is the larder of the swine.

c. 1430.  Syr Gener. (Roxb.), 7228. Of oon he hoped larder to make.

c. 1450.  Merlin, 337. The knyghtes of the rounde table made soche lardure thourgh the felde as it hadde ben shepe strangeled with wolves.

  3.  attrib. and Comb.: larder-beetle, an insect that devours stored animal foods, Dermestes lardarius (Cent. Dict.); larder-fly, ? the same; † larder-house = sense 1; † larder-silver, some kind of manorial dues (cf. larding money).

1836–9.  Todd, Cycl. Anat., II. 872/2. In the maggot of the *larder-flies … the mouth is formed … differently.

1390–1.  Earl Derby’s Exped. (Camden), 24. Duobus valettis pro mundacione le *larderhous, vj d.

1460–1.  Durham Acc. Rolls (Surtees), 90. Pro le pavyng in le larderhouse.

c. 1540.  Boorde, The boke for to Lerne, B j b. The celler, the kytchyn, the larderhowse with al other howses of offices.

a. 1568.  Ascham, Scholem., I. (Arb.), 45. This similitude is not rude, nor borowed of the larder house.

1486–7.  Bailiff’s MS. Acc. Dunster Boro’., De iiij^s vj^d de proficuis cujusdam consuetudinis vocati *Larder sylver.

  Hence Larderless a., without a larder.

1852.  Ford, in Q. Rev., March, 436. The barren larderless venta … without shelter or food for man or beast.