Forms: 5 batyldoure, -dore, batylledore, (batyndore, badildore), batildure, 6 -dore, batil(l)dore, batteldore, 7 battledoore, 6–9 battledoor, 6– battledore. [Perh. ad. Pr. batedor ‘beater’; cf. Sp. batidor applied to instruments as well as to persons, f. batir to beat; Minsheu gives a Sp. batador, with the meaning of a beetle used in washing. But historical connection with these Romanic words is not proved, and the date offers difficulties. If we refer the first part to BATTLE v.4, or to BAT, the -dore remains without satisfactory explanation.]
1. A beetle or wooden ‘bat’ used in washing, also (when made cylindrical) for smoothing out or ‘mangling’ linen clothes; hence also applied to similarly shaped instruments, e.g., the paddle of a canoe, a utensil for inserting loaves into an oven, or glass-ware into the kiln, etc.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 27. Batyldoure, or wasshynge betylle, feretorium.
c. 1450. in Wülcker, Voc., /582. Feritorium, batyndore. /601. Pecten, batyndore.
1483. Cath. Angl., 17. Badildore, batildure, pecten.
c. 1555. Harpsfield, Divorce Hen. VIII. (1878), 276. [She] all to beat her yokemate with a wash-beetle or battledore.
1617. F. Moryson, Itin., I. 11. Boats of a hollow tree, driuen … by battledores.
1655. Queen’s Clos. Open., 222 (D.). Rowl them [the gumbals] with battledores into long pieces, and tie them up in knots, and so dry them.
1822. J. Platts, Bk. Curios., 579. A Laundress … turning the clothes up and down with her hand and battledore.
1883. Knowledge, 22 June, 371/2. The loaves are inserted … by means of a flat battledore with a long handle, called a ‘peel.’
2. An instrument like a small racket used in playing with a shuttlecock.
1598. Florio, Poletta, a scoope or batledore to play at tenis with.
1690. Locke, Educ., Wks. 1812, IX. 126. Play-things … as tops, gigs, battledores.
1836–7. Dickens, Sk. Boz (1850), 274/2. The shuttlecocks fluttered from the little deal battledores.
b. The game played with this by two persons who strike the shuttlecock to and from each other.
1719. D’Urfey, Pills (1872), II. 303.
| Have you seen Battledore play, | |
| Where the Shuttlecock flys to and fro One? |
1782. Cowper, Lett. to Hill, 7 Dec. I … have been playing at battledore and shuttlecock.
1794. Scott, in Lockhart (1839), I. 311. I hope they are improved at the battledore.
fig. 1879. Lowell, Orient. Apol., Poet. Wks. 363. So they two played at wordy battledore.
† 3. (more fully battledore-book): A horn-book; so called from its usual shape. Hence battledore boy, an abecedarian. Obs. or dial.
1693. W. Robertson, Phraseol. Gen., 215. A battledore book, or Horn-book: Abecedarium. Ibid. A Battledore boy or Horn-book-boy.
1697. G. Keith, 2nd Narr. Turner’s Hall, 9. G. H. has Printed … a Battle-dore to teach them to speak true English.
1877. E. Peacock, Manley (Linc.) Gloss., Battledoor, a piece of cardboard on which was printed the A. B. C., the Lord’s prayer, and a few short syllables, employed as a substitute for the horn-book. They were in use here, in dames’ schools, thirty years ago. ‘He doesn’t knaw his A. B. C. fra a battledoor’ perhaps refers to this.
1884. Mrs. Banks, In his own Hand, xx. Behold the lad with battledore or book before him.
4. Battledore barley: a species of cultivated barley (Hordeum zeocriton) with short broad ears, also called Sprat barley.
1848. Milburn, in Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc., IX. II. 506. The variety of barley usually sown is Chevalier … the ‘battledore,’ an old variety, is nearly extinct.
5. Phrases. Not to know a B from a battledore (arch.): to be utterly illiterate; To say B (or Bo!) to a battledore (obs.): to open one’s mouth in speech (cf. to say Bo! to a goose); hence, battledore is alliteratively used along with B in various locutions.
1553–87. Foxe, A. & M., II. 474. He knew not a B from a battledore nor ever a letter of the book.
1592. Nashe, P. Penilesse, 30 b. Now you talke of a Bee, Ile tell you a tale of a Battle-dore. Ibid. (1599), Lent. Stuffe, Wks. 1885, V. 197. Euery man can say Bee to a Battledore, and write in prayse of Vertue.
1621. Bp. Mountagu, Diatribæ, 118. The Clergy of this time were … not able to say bo to a battledore.
1630. J. Taylor (Water P.), Wks., II. 43/1. Criticks … That of a B. will make a Battledore.
1877. [see 3].
1884. Black, Jud. Shaks., xxi. Fools that scarce know a B from a battledoor.
