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brazier

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Etymology and origin of the English word brazier

Pronunciation

  • /ˈbɹeɪʒəɹ/[1]
  • UK: /ˈbɹeɪ.ʒə(ɹ)/, /ˈbɹeɪ.zjə(ɹ)/[1]
  • US: /ˈbɹeɪ.ʒɚ/[1]

brazier1 worker in brass

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Derivation
First attested
1307
Ultimate origin
Old English bræs

Etymology

The word for the worker in brass is inherited from Middle English brasier,[2][3] formed from Middle English bras (“brass”) + -ier.[3][4][5] Hoad and the Shorter Oxford think it was probably modelled on the pair glass and glazier.[6][7][8] The OED instead takes braze as the base, with a query for brass itself,[9] and Collins and Dictionary.com derive it from Old English bræsian (“to work in brass”) with the agent suffix.[10][11] The noun for the metal goes back to bræs (“brass, bronze”), which has no known cognates beyond English.[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

A worker in copper, bronze or brass: 1307, as Brasier, in a record the Middle English Dictionary cites from G. Otto's Handwerkernamen.[2][4] The first quotation in the OED is from the Promptorium Parvulorum of about 1440, where the word translates Latin erarius.[9][2]

Semantic evolution

The sense has hardly moved: in Middle English the word named a worker in copper, bronze or brass, and it was also a surname.[2] Johnson (1755) entered the word under the spelling brasier, as a manufacturer who works in brass, with a quotation from Shakespeare's Henry VIII,[13] and under brazier he quoted Swift on selling halfpence to the brazier.[13] The Shorter Oxford now labels the word archaic.[7]

Timeline

  • 1307 – brasier, a worker in brass.[2][4] The OED's first quotation is from about 1440.[9]
  • 1327 – as a surname.[2]
  • late 18th century – braziery, a brazier's work.[7]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (archaic) A person who works in brass; a brass founder.[7][3][10][9]

Word family

  • braziery

brazier2 pan for hot coals

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1690 Fop Dictionary
Borrowed from
French brasier
Ultimate origin
Old French brese

Etymology

The word for the pan of hot coals is borrowed from French brasier (“pan of hot coals”),[4][12][3][9] from Old French brasier (“fire of hot coals”),[4][3] from brese (“embers, live coals”),[4][12][3] in modern French braise (“hot coals”).[9][7][5] Etymonline traces the Old French noun further to Proto-West Germanic *brasa and to Proto-Indo-European *bhreu- (“to boil, bubble, burn”).[12] The OED notes that some older spellings point to a former stress on the last syllable, as in grenadier.[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

A pan or tray for holding burning charcoal: 1690, in the Fop Dictionary.[9][4] Merriam-Webster Unabridged has about 1690,[3] and Etymonline the 1680s.[12]

Semantic evolution

The word came in for a large flat pan or tray of burning charcoal,[9] and the portable stand used for heating or cooking is its current sense.[10][7] Merriam-Webster Unabridged also records a cooking utensil that exposes the food to live coals or electricity through a wire grill.[3] From the same French noun for hot coals English later took braise, in the mid 18th century, at first for cooking something on a brazier.[14]

Timeline

  • 1690 – a pan or tray holding burning charcoal.[9][4][3]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A portable metal pan or stand for burning charcoal or coal, used for heating or cooking: The guards warmed their hands at a brazier by the gate.[10][3][7]
  2. A cooking utensil in which food is exposed to the heat through a wire grill.[3]
  • brass
  • braze
  • braise
  • glazier
  • brasero

Usage notes

In Northern Ireland brazier was also a name for some fishes: the pout, the poor cod and the sea bream.[15]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  5. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  6. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f g Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  10. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  11. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  12. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  13. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  14. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  15. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Brazier.” Etymologically, 6 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/brazier. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

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