forester

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English forester, also forster,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French forestier (“forest ranger, forest-dweller”),^[5][6][7][8] from forest, the source of forest,^[5][6][9] with the suffix -ier.^[3] The Anglo-Norman noun, for an official in charge of a forest and for a forest-dweller, is recorded from 1136–37.^[10] The Shorter Oxford compares the Anglo-Latin form forestarius.^[9] As a surname the word goes back to the late 12th century, according to Etymonline.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

An officer in charge of a forest: 1297, in Robert of Gloucester's Chronicle.^[5] Etymonline has the late 13th century,^[6] and Dictionary.com 1250–1300.^[11]

Semantic evolution

The first forester was the officer who watched over a royal forest and its game,^[3][2] and the title could be hereditary, as forester in fee shows.^[5][2] Chaucer uses the word four times.^[12] The sense was then widened to anyone looking after growing timber on an estate,^[5][3] and in modern use it means a person trained in forestry.^[13][14] The other line of senses, a person who lives in a forest, goes back to the French word,^[6] and is found in English from 1513, in G. Douglas's Virgil.^[5] Johnson (1755) gave both "an officer of the forest" and "an inhabitant of the wild country".^[15] It was then extended to animals (1630) and trees (1691), and later to moths (1819).^[5] From 1851 it also means a member of the Ancient Order of Foresters, a friendly society.^[5][14] In dialect a forester could be a New Forest pony in Hampshire or a stag in Devon, and in Cumberland forester oats were a duty paid to the forester.^[16]

Timeline

• 1297 – an officer in charge of a forest.^[5]
• before 1387 – forester of the King of France, an early title of the governor of Flanders.^[5]
• 1513 – a person who lives in a forest.^[5]
• 1630 – a wild animal of the forest, later especially a New Forest pony; in Australia, the eastern grey kangaroo.^[5]
• 1691 – a forest tree.^[5]
• 1819 – a moth of the family Zygaenidae.^[5]
• 1851 – a member of the Ancient Order of Foresters.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person trained in forestry, or in charge of a forest or of the timber on an estate.^[13][14][3]
2. (historical) An officer charged with watching over a royal forest and its game.^[3][5][2]
3. A person or animal that lives in a forest.^[13][14][5]
4. A half-wild pony of the New Forest in England.^[3][5][16]
5. In Australia, the large eastern grey kangaroo.^[5][9]
6. Any of various moths: Old World moths of the genus Ino with metallic green wings,^[14][5] or chiefly black noctuid moths of the subfamily Agaristinae.^[13]
7. A member of the Ancient Order of Foresters, a friendly society.^[14][5]

Related words

• forest
• forestry
• afforest
• deforest

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d 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 Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ Mayhew, A. L.; Skeat, Walter W. (1888), A Concise Dictionary of Middle English from A.D. 1150 to 1580, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
11. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
12. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
13. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
14. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
15. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
16. ^ a b 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)