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slaver

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Etymology and origin of the English word slaver

slaver1 to drool; saliva

Confidence
Disputed
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1325 before 1325, Glossary of Walter de Bibbesworth
Borrowed from
Old Norse slafra via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Old Norse slafra

Pronunciation

  • UK: /ˈslavə/, /ˈsleɪvə/[1]
  • US: /ˈslævər/, /ˈsleɪvər/, /ˈslɑvər/[1]

Etymology

The word for drooling is inherited from Middle English slaveren,[2][3][4] and sources disagree on what lies behind it.[1][5][4] Many dictionaries take it as borrowed from Old Norse slafra (“to slaver”),[6][7][8][9][10][2] or more broadly as Scandinavian,[11][4] and Etymonline and Klein call the Norse verb imitative.[6][8] Barnhart compares Norwegian slabbe (“to slop, eat noisily”) and the cognates Middle Low German slabben and Middle Dutch slabben (“to eat or drink noisily”),[11] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged adds German schlabbern (“to slaver”).[4] Others point to a source in Low Dutch or Low German, ultimately imitative and related to slobber.[5][12][13] The OED, revised in 2022, calls the origin uncertain, perhaps the same Germanic base as slabber, and notes that its Scandinavian comparisons are all recorded considerably later: Icelandic slafra (“to lick away, slurp, talk nonsense”) from the 17th century, Faroese slavra, and Swedish slafsa from 1697.[1] The noun, recorded at the same date, probably comes from the verb.[1][11][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

To let saliva run from the mouth: before 1325, in the glosses to Walter de Bibbesworth's treatise, where L'enfaunt bave de nature is glossed slaveryt of kynde.[1][2] The noun, saliva running from the mouth, is in the same text, glossing baavure.[1][11]

Semantic evolution

A Middle English quotation of before 1425 has “His mouthe slavers, his tethe rotes”,[2] and the verb could also mean to crave food, a sense now obsolete, and once to stammer.[1][2] From the late 16th century it spread to saliva itself as the subject (1582) and to wetting something with saliva (1587).[1][5] The figurative use for meaningless, lustful or fawning talk is recorded from 1594, in Nashe;[1] the revised OED has this well before the Shorter Oxford's mid 18th century.[1][5] The noun followed in 1605 for worthless talk and flattery,[1] and is now chiefly regional in Britain in that sense.[1] Johnson (1755) gave the noun as "spittle running from the mouth; drivel".[14] Merriam-Webster Unabridged records the modern senses of craving and of servile praise.[4] Wright's dialect dictionary found the verb from Scotland and Ireland to Kent, often spelled slavver.[15]

Timeline

  • before 1325 – to let saliva run from the mouth; noun, saliva running from the mouth.[1][11]
  • 1582 – of saliva, to run from the mouth.[1][5]
  • 1587 – to wet or cover with saliva.[1][5]
  • 1594 – to utter meaningless, lustful or fawning words; to fawn over or lust after.[1]
  • 1599 – to utter words in such a manner.[1]
  • 1605 – noun, worthless language, nonsense, flattery.[1]
  • 1623 – noun, mucus or another viscous fluid of an animal, especially a snail (obsolete by 1677).[1]
  • 1794 – to kiss, caress or flatter someone in a lustful or fawning manner.[1]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To let saliva run from the mouth; to drool or slobber: The mastiff slavered over its dinner.[12][4][1]
  2. To fawn over someone or praise them with servile flattery.[12][4][1]
  3. To show eager desire; to crave or lust after: Collectors were slavering over the painting.[12][4][1]
  4. (rare) Of saliva, to run from the mouth.[1][5]
  5. (archaic) To wet or smear with saliva.[4][16]

Noun

  1. Saliva running from the mouth.[12][4][1]
  2. Foolish talk; drivel, or excessive flattery; now chiefly British regional.[1][12][4][5]

Word family

  • slaverer
  • slaveringly
  • beslaver

slaver2 slave dealer, slave ship

Confidence
Established
Formation
Derivation
First attested
1786 letter in T. Clarkson, Essay on Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species
Ultimate origin
Medieval Latin Sclavus
Etymology tree of slaver2
inherited borrowed derived
Latin sclavus
English slave
English slaver
French esclave
Italian schiavo
Spanish esclavo
From the same root · slaver2
English enslave ← sclavus
English slavery ← slave

Pronunciation

  • UK: /ˈsleɪvə/[1]
  • US: /ˈsleɪvər/[1]

Etymology

The word for the slave dealer is formed from English slave + -er.[1][5][4][16][8] Etymonline takes it as an agent noun from the verb, perhaps following the earlier slave-ship (1792).[6] The base noun is from Old French esclave and directly from Medieval Latin Sclavus (“slave, originally Slav”).[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A slave trader: 1786, in a letter printed by T. Clarkson: “With a justice and generosity, never I believe before heard of among slavers, we gave those their liberty”.[1] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates the word to 1827,[4] and Dictionary.com to 1815–25.[16]

Semantic evolution

By 1818 the word also meant a ship used for carrying enslaved people.[1] It widened to those who held slaves: the Boston Liberator wrote in 1831 of “those gentlemen slavers, who hold two millions of human beings in thraldom”.[1] The Shorter Oxford reverses the order, with the ship from the early 19th century and the person from the mid 19th,[5] and Etymonline dates them to 1830 and 1842.[6] Merriam-Webster Unabridged also uses it for a white slaver,[4] and the OED and the Shorter Oxford now mark the word as chiefly historical.[1][5]

Timeline

  • 1786 – a person who captures, transports or deals in slaves.[1] Etymonline dates this sense to 1842.[6]
  • 1818 – a ship used for transporting enslaved people.[1] Etymonline dates this sense to 1830.[6]
  • 1831 – a person who holds people in slavery, or who upholds the institution.[1]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A person who deals in slaves; a slave trader: The captain had worked as a slaver before the trade was banned.[12][4][1]
  2. A slave ship.[12][16][1]
  3. An owner of slaves, or an upholder of slavery; now chiefly historical.[12][16][1]
  4. A white slaver.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e 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. ^ Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  7. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  8. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  9. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  10. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  11. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  12. ^ a b c d e f g h i Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  13. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  14. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  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)
  16. ^ a b c d e Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House

Related etymologies

  • kettle · also from Old Norse
  • thrall · also from Old Norse
  • thwart · also from Old Norse
  • haggle · also from Old Norse
  • awkward · also from Old Norse
  • same · also from Old Norse
  • big · also from Old Norse
  • until · also from Old Norse
Cite this entry

“Slaver.” Etymologically, 7 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/slaver. Accessed 7 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·