Forms: α. 5 conduyt(t)our, -ditour, 6 -duyter, -duiter. β. 5–8 -ductor, 6–7 -ductour, 6– -ductor. [Two types: α. ME. conduitour, a. OF. conduitor, -our, -eur:—L. conductōr-em, agent-n. from condūcĕre to CONDUCT. Under the influence of L. the F. was sometimes spelt conduicteur in 14–15th c., and was finally superseded by the mod.F. form conducteur (14th c. in Littré) after L. Hence, in Eng. also, β. conductor, in conformity with the Latin.]
I. A person, etc., that conducts, leads, guides, etc.
1. One who leads, guides, or escorts; a leader, guide (lit. and fig.).
1481. Caxton, Godfrey (E.E.T.S.), li. (heading), Faynyng to be a trewe conduytour and guyde.
1526. Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W., 1531), 71 b. The sterre of grace as our chefe conductour and gouernour.
a. 1530. Everyman, in Hazl., Dodsl., I. 126. O ransomer and redeemer! Of all the world hope and conduyter.
1632. Hayward, trans. Biondi’s Eromena, 37. The conductors-backe of the she-slave.
1684. Bunyan, Pilgr., II. 144. Pray do you go along with us, I will be your Conductor.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1776), IV. 275. The elephant’s conductor is usually mounted upon its neck.
1836. Dickens, Sk. Boz, Visit to Newgate. Following our Conductor … we arrived at a small door.
† b. One who brings or procures, a bringer. Obs. rare. c. One who introduces.
1681. Crowne, Hen. VI., III. 37. Thou hast been conductor of my shame.
1802. Ann. Reg., 176. The persons intrusted to swear others, or, in the phrase of society, to initiate them, were termed conductors.
† 2. One who conveys or carries goods, a carrier.
c. 1530. Ld. Berners, Arth. Lyt. Bryt. (1814), 63. They toke al the stuffe, and dyd bette and iltrete theym that were conductours therof.
1622. Malynes, Anc. Law-Merch., 148. Goods and merchandises sent by land … by the Conductors or Carriers to Venice, Frankford, or any other places.
3. Mil. ‘An assistant to a commissary of military stores, to conduct depôts or magazines from one place to another’ (Crabb); originally, a driver of artillery or ammunition wagons; see also quot. 1778.
1650. R. Elton, Milit. Art (1668), 224. The Commissioner that hath the charge … hath for his assistence 24 Conductors or more, according to the number of Waggons, each mounted and armed.
1661. J. B., Brief Instr. Exerc. Cavalry, 19. A Principal Conductor for the Artillery for draught Horses and Ammunition.
1745. Gentl. Mag., 249. Artillery … Wounded. 1 Conductor, 2 Serjeants, 1 Corporal.
1778. Milit. Dict., Conductors are assistants given to the commissary of the stores, to receive or deliver out stores to the army, to attend at the magazines by turns, when in Garrison, and to look after the ammunition waggons when in the field.
1808. Wellington, 8 Aug., in Gurw., Disp., IV. 71. One clerk of stores who is also Paymaster, and five conductors of stores.
b. By Royal Warrant of 11th Jan., 1879, Conductors of Supplies and Conductors of Stores were raised to the rank of ‘Warrant Officers’; they are now employed in the general duties of the Detachment to which they belong, much in the same way as a Subaltern Officer is.
1879. Queen’s Regulations, Duties of Conductors, ¶ 4 § 7. Conductors of the Army Service corps and Ordnance Store corps will supply the place of subaltern officers when required, but they will not sit as members of Courts of Inquiry or on Regimental boards.
II. A commander, director, manager.
† 4. A commander, leader (esp. military or naval). Obs. See CONDUCT v. 4.
c. 1450. Merlin, 392. A goode conditour that sette light by theise enmyes.
1483. Caxton, Gold. Leg., 201/1. Duc and conduytour of thoste. Ibid. (c. 1490), Blanchardyn, 158. Men of armes … of the whiche ben conducters & chieff rulers, the kyng of fryse, [etc.].
1555. Eden, Decades, 59. Lupus Olanus the conductor of one of the shippes of Nicuesa.
1590. Sir J. Smyth, Disc. Weapons, 46. Archers on horseback under their Captaines or conductours.
1624. Darcie, Birth of Heresies, iii. 12. Iephta Iudge, and Conductor of the Israelites.
1649. Selden, Laws Eng., I. lxv. (1739), 138. They came in a warlike manner, under one conducter, whom they called a King.
1864. Kirk, Chas. Bold, II. IV. iii. 420. The ‘conductors’ or commanders of companies, received their commissions from the duke.
5. One who conducts or manages (a business, undertaking, journal, etc.); see CONDUCT v. 6.
1634. W. Tirwhyt, trans. Balzac’s Lett., 28. You precede in the affaires of Europe, by being conductor of the Fortune of France.
1753. Smollett, Ct. Fathom (1813), II. 110. One would have imagined he had been conductor to Madam Catherina from his cradle.
1790. Beatson, Nav. & Mil. Mem., I. 181. This glorious enterprize, does the conductors of it the greatest honour.
1799. Med. Jrnl., I. 423 [Letter]. To the Conductors of the Medical and Physical Journal.
1843. Miall, Nonconf., III. 1. No effort on the part of its conductors, will be wanting to render it an interesting journal.
1854. Tomlinson, Arago’s Astron., 91. He sent a communication to the conductors of the Berlin Observatory.
6. Mus. The director of an orchestra or chorus, who indicates to the performers the rhythm, expression, etc., of the music by motions of a baton or of the hands.
Now always distinguished from the leader or player of the principal instrument (usually the first violin) in an orchestra; the two functions were formerly not clearly differentiated. A historical account is given in Grove, Dict. Mus., s.v.
1784–5. Ann. Register, 334. Conductor, Joah Bates, Esq.
1820. in Grove, Dict. Mus., s.v., The programmes of the Philharmonic Society (founded 1813) for the first seven years always end with … ‘Leader Mr. ——, Pianoforte Mr. ——’ … With the second concert of 1820 (March 20) the announcement changes to ‘Leader, Mr. Spagnoletti; Conductor, Mr. Cramer.’
1824. Miss Mitford, Village, Ser. I. (1863), 173. Our conductor (to borrow a musical term) is but a little farmer’s second son.
1846. Philharm. Soc. Programme (Grove). Conductor, Signor Costa.
7. The official who has charge of the passengers, collects fares, and generally directs the proceedings, on an omnibus, tram-car, or (in U.S.) railroad train (= F. conducteur). (The guard on an English railway has similar but less comprehensive functions.)
1837. Penny Mag., 31 March, 117. He who hangs behind—who opens the door and receives the money … is conductor or, in the vulgar tongue, cad.
1851. Mayhew, Lond. Labour (1861), III. 355 (Hoppe). ‘I’m a conductor now, but wouldn’t be long behind a ’bus, if it wasn’t from necessity.’
1856. E. With, Railroad Accidents, 90. Want of communication between the conductor and the engine driver.
1873. S. Smith, Romance of the Rail (N. Y.), 9. Nor will a prudent Conductor leave the depot without the final ‘all aboard.’
1882. Freeman, in Longm. Mag., I. 90. ‘Conductor’ for ‘guard.’
1889. Lond. Gaz., 30 April, 2381/1 (Tramway Bye-laws). The conductor of each carriage shall enforce these Bye-laws and Regulations.
III. 8. One who hires; a lessee, farmer, tenant, [Only as Latin.]
1652. Needham, trans. Selden’s Mare Cl., 87. To becom a hirer or Conductor of the Sea.
1706. Phillips (ed. Kersey), Conductor (L.), a Tenant that Rents a House, or Land; an Undertaker of Work for Hire.
1875. Poste, Gaius, III. (ed. 2), 423. It is the locator who pays the price and the conductor who performs the service.
1880. Muirhead, Gaius, 538. The transfer following on the contract did not give the conductor the legal possession of what was given him in location.
IV. A thing that conducts, forms a channel, etc.
9. Anything that conducts, leads, or guides; a channel by which water, etc., is conducted.
1796. Morse, Amer. Geog., I. 166. This lake … is supposed to be the source or conductor of one branch of the river Bourbon.
1840. Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc., I. III. 347. The main conductors and large drains.
1852. Seidel, Organ, 55. Sometimes … the upper-board contains a number of holes, from which tubes project, into which the pipes are placed … called conductors.
1870. T. Holmes, Syst. Surg. (ed. 2), IV. 1045. A staff … to act as a guide or conductor for the knife to enter the bladder.
1882. Pall Mall G., 6 July, 6/2. That the Congo will be the chief conductor of trade into the centre of Africa.
b. A medium that transmits or conveys any disease or other condition.
1807. Med. Jrnl., XVII. 109. This impurity of the air did not serve as a conductor of contagion.
1878. trans. Ziemssen’s Cycl. Med., XVII. 26. The non-bleeder women in bleeder families are in fact the most frequent and most efficient ‘conductors’ (Vieli, Grandidier) of hæmophilia.
† 10. Surg. An instrument formerly used in lithotomy as a guide for the introduction of the forceps into the bladder, a gorget. Obs.
1706. in Phillips (ed. Kersey).
1847. South, trans. Chelius’ Surg., II. 572. The gorget, conductor or dilator was then entered on the groove of the staff, the staff drawn back, and the neck of the bladder enlarged with the gorget. Ibid., II. 579. The left hand grasped the male conductor and the right carried the female, guided by the male, into the bladder.
11. Physics. A substance having the property of conducting or permitting the passage of heat, electricity, or other form of energy: see CONDUCT v. 9 c. Hence good c., bad c., non-conductor.
1745. W. Watson, in Phil. Trans., XLIII. 482, note. I call Non-electrics, or Conductors of Electricity, those Bodies … such as Wood, Animals living or dead, Metals, and vegetable Substances.
1751. Franklin, Lett., Wks. 1840, V. 260. The terms electric per se and non-electric should be laid aside as improper … the terms conductor and non-conductor may supply their place.
1800–8. Henry, Epit. Chem. (ed. 5), 36. Water is a conductor, though a slow and imperfect one, of caloric.
1812. Sir H. Davy, Chem. Philos., 78. Gasses are worse conductors [of heat] than fluids, and fluids than solids.
1873. B. Stewart, Conserv. Force, lii. 61. Metal is a conductor, while glass is an insulator, or non-conductor, of electricity.
12. A device or arrangement (e.g., a wire, rod, or the like) for conducting electricity; that part of a cable, etc., by which the electricity is conducted.
1737. Desaguliers, in Phil. Trans., XLI. 193. I call Conductors those strings, to one end of which the rubb’d Tube is applied. Ibid., 206. If a long Non-electrical String be fasten’d to an Electrical per se, and extended to a great distance … all Bodies fasten’d at the End of it will become electrical … This String we have called the Conductor of Electricity.
1863. Wynter, Subtle Brains, 332. The gutta-percha covering, which formed the water-tight envelope to the wire, became so soft that it allowed the conductor to get out of the centre.
1879. Prescott, Sp. Telephone, p. iii. In 1837, Steinheil discovered … that the earth would serve as a conductor, thereby saving one wire in forming a circuit.
b. The name of certain parts of a frictional electric machine; particularly, of a massive peculiar-shaped piece of brass, insulated and fixed to the stand, for collecting the electricity; often termed the prime conductor.
1751. Franklin, Exper. Electr., 59. I have a large prime conductor made of several thin sheets of Fuller’s pasteboard.
1880. Gordon, Electr. & Magn. (1883), I. 9. On turning the handle [of the friction machine], the conductor becomes highly charged with positive electricity.
1882. Watts, Dict. Chem., II. 379. On turning the cylinder, the glass acquires positive electricity, the cushion and the brass conductor attached to it negative electricity, and the positive charge of the glass is transferred to the prime conductor.
c. Short for lightning-conductor: a pointed metallic rod fixed to the summit of a building (or the mast of a ship) as a defence against lightning, to conduct the atmospheric electricity away into the earth (or sea); a lightning-rod.
1770. J. L. Winn, in Phil. Trans., LX. 188. An account of the appearance of Lightning on a Conductor.
1822. Byron, Lett. to Moore, 23 Nov. The conductor (Franklin’s) of my house was struck by a thunderbolt.
1884. W. L. Carpenter, Energy in Nat., 95. Care should be taken … that their lower ends lead into damp ground; the neglect of this … will make the best-laid conductor practically useless.
