glaver

Of Celtic origin. Compare Welsh glafr (“flattery”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡlævə(ɹ)/

glaver (third-person singular simple present glavers, present participle glavering, simple past and past participle glavered)

1. (obsolete) To flatter; to wheedle.
   • 1692–1717, Robert South, Twelve Sermons Preached upon Several Occasions, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London:

     Some slavish, glavering, flattering parasite.

   • 1745, The trial of the Honourable Mrs. Gloriana Strut, before Lord Peter, chairman of the committee, held in the council-chamber, near the gates of paradise, page 10:

     Luke. Item, that the Honourable Ms. Gloriana Strut is ſo fantaſtical in her Dreſs, and trifles away ſo many Hours in admiring herſelf, and being glavered by her Maid, that ſhe always comes into Church, when the reſt of the Congregation are intent upon their Devotions;

   • 1900 January 20, “In a Glass Coach”, in The Academy, page 48:

     No doubt the users of hackney-coaches “glavered” on the users of glass-coaches. To glaver, need we say, was to fawn — with words of glozing courtesy, to flatter deceitfully.

• “glaver”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

• Gravel, gravel