sitter

Etymology

It is formed from English sit + -er,^[2][3][4][5] Middle English sitten with the agent suffix;^[6] the verb sit is from Old English sittan.^[7][4][8] The OED compares Middle Dutch sitter, also zitter (Dutch zitter), and Middle Low German sitter.^[2] The British slang sitter, a sitting room, is a separate formation with the Oxford -er.^[2][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OED's earliest record, from before 1300, is a name for the hare in the poem The Names of the Hare, a rare and obsolete use.^[2] Etymonline dates the general sense, one who sits or occupies a seat, to about 1300;^[4] the OED's first example of it is from about 1350.^[2]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English a sitter could also be a rider on a horse, a sense that lasted into the 19th century (from the Wycliffite Bible to 1861).^[2][6] Johnson (1755) gave "one that sits" and "a bird that broods", quoting Mortimer: "The oldest hens are reckoned the best sitters".^[9] The sense of one who sits for a portrait dates from 1649, in Lovelace,^[2][4] and later ones are tied to particular kinds of sitting: a passenger in a rowing boat (1653), a player in a game as opposed to a bystander (1748), a regular seat-holder in a Scottish church (1819–79), a person at a seance (1860) and a sit-in demonstrator (1960).^[2] In American slang a sitter was a drunk who sat about in saloons (1868)^[10] and a person paid by a bar to make customers buy drinks (1890).^[2][6] From shooting, where a sitting bird is easy to hit, the word came to mean an easy target or an easy chance (1900).^[10][6] By 1937 it was short for babysitter,^[4][2] and in combinations it now means anyone who looks after a person, house or animal for someone else.^[11] Oxford slang formed a separate sitter, a sitting room, in 1899, the base of bed-sitter.^[2] In north Yorkshire dialect a sitter was a person who waited in a neighbouring house to join a funeral procession,^[12] and in American speech it is a joking word for the buttocks.^[13]

Timeline

• before 1300 – a name for the hare (obsolete).^[2]
• c. 1350 – a person who sits or occupies a seat.^[2] Etymonline dates this sense to about 1300.^[4]
• before 1382 – a rider (obsolete after 1861).^[2]
• 1649 – a person who sits for a portrait.^[2][4]
• 1653 – a passenger in a rowing boat.^[2][3]
• 1860 – a person who attends a seance.^[2]
• 1868 – US slang, a drunk who sits about in saloons.^[10]
• 1890 – US slang, a bar employee who encourages customers to buy drinks.^[2]
• 1899 – Oxford slang, a sitting room.^[2]
• 1900 – an easy target or an easy chance.^[10]
• 1937 – short for babysitter.^[4]
• 1960 – a participant in a sit-in.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person or animal that sits.^[11][6]
2. A person who poses for a portrait, bust or photograph.^{[11][6][14][2]}
3. A babysitter; also, in compounds, a person who looks after a house, pet or person for someone else: a dog-sitter.^[11][6][15]
4. A hen or other bird sitting on its eggs to hatch them.^{[11][6][15][9]}
5. A person who attends a seance.^[6][2]
6. (informal) An easy target; in sport, an easy chance to score.^[6][10]
7. (US slang) A woman employed by a bar to get customers to buy drinks; a B-girl.^[6][2]
8. (obsolete, before 1382–1861) A rider.^[6][2]

Word family

• bed-sitter
• fence-sitter
• house sitter

Related words

• setter
• sitting duck
• sit
• babysitter
• sitting

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ 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.
10. ^ a b c d e Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
11. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
12. ^ 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)
13. ^ Cassidy, Frederic G. & Joan Houston Hall (eds.) (1985–2002), Dictionary of American Regional English, vols I–IV, Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
14. ^ Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
15. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin