Townsman

Forms: see TOWN. [f. town’s, genitive of TOWN + MAN sb.¹]

  † 1.  OE. (túnesman). One who lives in a tún; a villager, a villein. Obs.

962–3.  Laws of Edgar, IV. c. 13. And ic wille, þæt tunesmen and heora hyrdas habban þas ylcan smeaʓunge on minum cucum orfe and on minra þeʓena, ealswa hy habbað on heora aʓenum.

1028–60.  Laws Northumbld Priests, c. 59. ʓif hwilc tunesman æniʓne pæniʓ forhele oððe forhæbbe, ʓilde se landrica þone peniʓ and nime ænne oxan æt ðam men.

  2.  A man who lives in a town or city; a citizen: esp. as distinguished from a countryman, a stranger, a soldier of the garrison, or other such.

1433.  in Hist. Sudbury (1896), 125. A Supplicacon of the Maior and Tonsmen of Sudbury to the B. of Norwich.

1519.  Coventry Leet Bk., 666. Iff eny fforener or Townesman fforstall eny Corne within the libertie of this Cetie of Couentre or it com into the markett.

1577.  trans. Bullinger’s Decades (1592), 144. Of the countrie men as well as of the townesmen.

1615.  G. Sandys, Trav., 6. Here a garrison is kept; supplyed by the townesmen.

1745.  De Foe’s Eng. Tradesman, xxvi. (1841), I. 265. She being a good honest townsman’s daughter.

1749.  Little Cornard (Suff.) Overseers’ Acc. (MS.). Paid to Sarah Flower by the order of the Townes men that She Laid out.

1863.  H. Cox, Instit., III. ix. 727. The whole body of resident trading townsmen.

  b.  A man of one’s own or the same town; a fellow-townsman. Usually after possessive. Cf. COUNTRYMAN 2.

a. 1300.  Judas, in Rel. Ant., I. 144. Summe of thine tunesmen ther thou meist i-mete.

1601.  Dent, Pathw. Heaven (1831), 16. You condemn good neighbours and good townsmen.

1715–20.  Pope, Iliad, XVIII. 578. There, in the forum swarm a numerous train, The subject of debate, a townsman slain.

1838.  Thirlwall, Greece, II. xv. 258. A citizen of Abdera advised his townsmen to offer a solemn thanksgiving to the gods.

  c.  An ordinary citizen or resident of a university town as distinguished from a gownsman or member of the university; cf. TOWN sb. 5 d.

1768.  Wilkes, Corr. (1805), III. 254. Only another proof that the townsmen of Oxford have always hated the university.

1823.  Lamb, Elia, Ser. II. Poor Relations. The distance between the gownsmen and the townsmen, as they are called … is carried to an excess that [etc.].

1889.  Jessopp, Coming of Friars, vi. 273. The townsmen under great provocation had seized three of the gownsmen.

  3.  New England. = SELECTMAN.

1656.  in T. Dwight, Trav. New Eng. (1821), I. 343. [In 1656] town’s-men [(or select-men) were chosen].

1696–1715.  Maryland Laws, iv. (1723), 11. Any Action … arising between the Townsmen or Freemen of the said Town.

a. 1817.  T. Dwight, Trav. New Eng. (1821), I. 243. At this meeting the inhabitants choose, not exceeding seven men, inhabitants, able, discreet and of good conversation, to be Select-men, or Townsmen, to take care of the order, and prudential affairs of the town.