Now rare. [f. TABLE sb. and v. + -ER: in sense 1 = OF. tableour; in other senses = OF. tablier.]
† 1. A player at backgammon. Cf. TABLING vbl. sb. 2. Obs.
1561. Bp. Parkhurst, Injunctions, 19. Dycers, tablers, carders, swearers or vehemently suspected therof.
1571. Grindal, Injunctions, § 23 Rem. (Parker Soc.), 130. Nor any of you shall be … a hunter, hawker, dicer, carder, tabler.
† 2. Rendering Gr. τραπεζίτης, a money-changer.
c. 1550. Cheke, Matt. xxv. 27. You schold yeerfoor haav put out mi moni to ye tablers.
3. a. One who gets his meals at another’s table for payment; = BOARDER 1. Obs. or rare.
1598. Florio, Ital. Dict., Comensale, a fellow boorder, a fellowe commoner, a fellow tabler.
1641. Hinde, J. Bruen, iii. 10. He was sent … to be taught and trained up under one James Roc … where he continued a Scholler and Tabler for the space of three yeares.
a. 1714. M. Henry, Life F. Tallents, Wks. 1853, I. 624. He left off house-keeping, and went to be a tabler.
1755. Johnson, Boarder, a tabler; one that eats with another at a settled rate.
† b. One who boards persons. Obs.
1665. Brathwait, Comment Two Tales, 8. We are to suppose him to be a Lodger or Tabler of Scholars and other Artists, for their Chamber and weekly Commons.
4. Possible in senses 4–8 of TABLE v.; as in ‘the tabler of the resolution,’ etc.
