[f. FLAY v. + -ER1.]
1. One who flays; also fig. one who ‘fleeces’ or practises extortion.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 165/1. Flear of beest, excoriator.
1598. Florio, Scórticaporcélci, a fleaer of hogs.
1613. Purchas, Pilgrimage, II. xiii. § 1. Euerie Foxe must yeeld his owne skinne and haires to the flayer.
1800. Hurdis, The Favourite Village, 152.
| Her lamb | |
| By the bleak season slain, her welted coat | |
| Yields to the flayer. |
1865. Dickens, Mut. Fr., III. i. Whatever you do, Lammle, don’t—don’t—don’t, I beg of you—ever fall into the hands of Pubsey and Co. in the next room, for they are grinders. Regular flayers and grinders, my dear Lammle, repeated Fledgeby with a peculiar relish, ‘and they’ll skin you by the inch, from the nape of your neck to the sole of your foot, and grind every inch of your skin to tooth-powder.’
2. Hist. (transl. F. écorcheur). One of a number of French brigands in the 14th century, who ‘flayed’ or pillaged the people.
1832. trans. Sismondi’s Ital. Rep., xiv. 310. The French … had bands called flayers (écorcheurs), formed in the English wars, and long trained to grind the people.
1891. A. Conan Doyle, The White Company, xxix., in Cornh. Mag., XVII. Oct., 416. His whole life was spent in raids and outfalls upon the Brabanters, late-comers, flayers, free companions, and roving archers who wandered over his province.
