gownsman

[ gounz-muhn ]

noun

, plural gowns·men.

1. a person who wears a gown indicating office, profession, or status.

Word History and Origins

Origin of gownsman¹

First recorded in 1570–80; gown + 's ¹ + man

Example Sentences

What! murder a gownsman for a bit of folly?

From Project Gutenberg

An early gownsman, flinging wide his shutters before settling to his morning's work, smiled down on the wild rake who must have come in too drunk to find his way to bed.

From Project Gutenberg

So she, in her goldlaced riding-habit, had come too to the tryst that she might look on her hero once again; and for propriety's sake had brought as escort Papa Curran and gentle Sara, who, though only sixteen, was already casting timid sheep's-eyes at the younger of the two Emmetts--a gownsman at this time in the University.

From Project Gutenberg

Snob, snob, n. a vulgar person, esp. one who apes gentility, a tuft-hunter: a shoemaker: a workman who works for lower wages than his fellows, a rat, one who will not join a strike: a townsman, as opposed to a gownsman, in Cambridge slang.—n.

From Project Gutenberg

The Snob, Gownsman, National Omnibus, National Standard, The Constitutional, and Fraser's Magazine all contain essays, articles, or tales from his able pen, which, but for Mr. Johnson's patient efforts, might have been lost in course of time, when the evidence to identify them would have been wanting.

From Project Gutenberg