[Cf. ON. sverðberari.] A person who bears a sword. a. spec. A municipal official who carries a sword of state before a magistrate on ceremonial occasions.

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1431.  Rec. St. Mary at Hill (1905), 15. The Mayres Swerd berer for the tyme beyng.

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a. 1471.  Rolls of Parlt., V. 396/1. Kerver and Swordberer to the said moste heynous Traytour.

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1518.  Star Chamber Cases (Selden Soc.), II. 143. Officers of the same Towne, as Recorder, Towne Clerke, Swordberer, attorney and other.

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a. 1674.  Clarendon, Hist. Reb., XVI. § 118. The City of London sent a Letter to him by their Sword-Bearer.

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1708.  Lond. Gaz., No. 4464/5. His Lordship … carried the Sword bareheaded before Her Majesty … to the Church, where the City Sword-bearer receiv’d it from his Lordship.

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a. 1734.  North, Lives (1826), I. 251. There was one Row in office of swordbearer; which in that town [sc. Bristol] is pronounced sorberer. I thought it sounded like Cerberus.

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1835.  App. Munic. Corpor. Rep., I. 60. The Sword-bearer [of Gloucester] is elected for life by the corporation…. His only duties are to attend upon the mayor, and to carry the sword.

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  b.  An attendant on a military man of rank, or on a chief, who carries his master’s sword when not worn.

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1660.  in Verney Mem. (1904), II. 151. What the Sword-bearer brought of Monke’s coming up, may bee falsly rendered by him.

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  c.  gen. One who carries or wears a sword.

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1530.  Palsgr., 278/1. Swerdeberer, porteur despee.

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1538.  Elyot, Macherophorus, a sworde bearer.

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1570.  Jewel, View Bull Pius V. (1582), 4. [Saint] Paule the Swordebearer.

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1802.  James, Milit. Dict., Sword-bearer, one who wears a sword.

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  d.  A ruler or magistrate having authority to punish offenders (with allusion to Rom. xiii. 4).

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1660.  R. Coke, Justice Vind., 32. Though he makes no difference between Swordbearers and Swordtakers, between Gods Ministers, and Theeves and Robbers; yet the Holy Ghost does, for Gods Minister is a Swordbearer.

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1691.  Baxter, Nat. Ch., xi. 49. Supposing such Bishops qualified…, and usurping none of the Sword-bearers power.

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  e.  One of an order of knights in Poland, founded in 1204: see PORT-GLAIVE.

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1656.  [see PORT-GLAIVE].

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1693.  d’Emiliane’s Hist. Monast. Orders, 287. Of the Order of Teutonick Knights, Marrianes, or Sword-bearers.

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1728.  Chambers, Cycl., s.v. Teutonic, In 1204, Duke Albert had founded the Order of Sword-bearers, Port-Glaives.

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1784.  H. Clark, Hist. Knighthood, II. 88. Albert then Bishop of Livonia … prescribed to these Knights the Cistercian rule and habit, viz. a long white mantle and black hood; on the breast two swords in saltire, whence they had the title of Brethren Sword-Bearers.

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1841.  Penny Cycl., XX. 248/1. Most of these [German] families settled there [sc. in the Baltic provinces] when the Order of the Knights Sword-bearers was the acknowledged sovereign of these countries (from 1300 to 1530).

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  Hence Swordbearership, the office of a swordbearer (sense a).

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1535.  Cranmer, Lett. to Crumwell, in Misc. Writ. (Parker Soc.), II. 307. His preferment unto the room of the sword-bearership of London.

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