Pl. -staffs, or -staves. [Contraction of tipped or tipt staff: see TIPPED ppl. a.1 3.]
† 1. A staff with a tip or cap of metal, carried as a badge by certain officials: see 2. Obs.
1541–2. Act 33 Hen. VIII., c. 12 § 26. Anye of the Kinges … officers, that … shall strike any person … withe anye staffe commonlye called a Tipp staffe.
1579–80. North, Plutarch (1676), 219. Sergeants and other Officers holding Tipstaves in their hands.
1695. Congreve, Love for L., I. iv. Two suspicious Fellows like lawful Pads, that would knock a Man down with Pocket Tipstaves.
† b. pl. Used for ‘stilts.’ Obs. nonce-use.
1582. Stanyhurst, Craking Cutter, in Æneis, etc. (Arb.), 143. Linckt was in wedlock a loftye Thrasonical huf snuffe: In gate al on typstau’s stalcking, in phisnomye daring.
2. An official carrying a tipped staff; spec. a. A sheriff’s officer, bailiff, constable; b. An officer appointed to wait upon a court in session; a court crier or usher. arch.
1570. Foxe, A. & M. (ed. 2), 1365/1. The knight Marshall with all hys tippe staues.
1600. Holland, Livy, XLV. xxix. 1220. When they saw the tipstaves and huishers to keepe the doores and places of entrie.
1687. Magd. Coll. & Jas. II. (O.H.S.), 148. Then their Lordships … commissioned Atterbury the Tipstaff to fetch a Smith to force them open.
1710. J. Harris, Lex. Techn., II. Tip-staves, are the Warden of the Fleets Officers attending the Queen’s Courts with a Painted Staff, for taking into Custody such Persons [etc.].
1831. Carlyle, Sart. Res., I. ix. Those ministering Sheriffs and Lord-Lieutenants and Hangmen and Tipstaves.
1882. Serjt. Ballantine, Exper., xli. 387. They were tipstaves, prepared to take [him] … into custody.
1888. Gow, Comp. School Classics, 290. Order was maintained by tip-staffs, ῤαβδοῦχοι.
Hence Tipstavery (nonce-wd.), a body of tipstaffs.
1911. B. Capes, Loaves & Fishes, 224. Cracking their inevitable chestnuts for the benefit of an obsequious tipstavery.
