waiter

Definition

A male or female attendant who serves customers at their tables in a restaurant, café or similar.

Etymology

From late 14th century Middle English waiter, wayter (“attendant, watchman”). By surface analysis, wait + -er. Sense of "servant who waits at tables" is from late 15th century, originally in reference to household servants; in reference to inns, eating houses, etc., it is attested from 1660s. Feminine form waitress first recorded 1834. The London Stock Exchange sense harks back to the early days of trading in coffee-shops.

Example Sentences

• "Waiter! There's a fly in my soup."
• "She was a fat, round little woman, richly apparelled in velvet and lace, […]; and the way she laughed, cackling like a hen, the way she talked to the waiters and the maid,[…]—all these unexpected phenomena impelled one to hysterical mirth, and made one class her with such immortally ludicrous types as Ally Sloper, the Widow Twankey, or Miss Moucher."
• "A waiter brought his aperitif, which was a small scotch and soda, and as he sipped it gratefully he sighed. ‘Civilized,’ he said to Mr. Campion. ‘Humanizing.’ […] ‘Cigars and summer days and women in big hats with swansdown face-powder, that's what it reminds me of.’"

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