"Redare of howsys, calamator, arundinarius" (Prompt. Parv.)—
and the latter is a Norman variant of Butcher, as already mentioned.
The spelling of occupative surnames often differs from that now associated with the trade itself. In Naylor, Taylor, and Tyler we have the archaic preference for y. [Footnote: It may be noted here that John Tiler of Dartford, who killed a tax-gatherer for insulting his daughter, was not Wat Tiler, who was killed at Smithfield for insulting the King. The confusion between the two has led to much sympathy being wasted on a ruffian.] Our ancestors thought sope as good a spelling as soap, hence the name Soper. A Plummer, i.e. a man who worked in lead, Lat. plumbum, is now written, by etymological reaction, plumber, though the restored letter is not sounded. A man who dealt in 'arbs originated the name Arber, which we should now replace by herbalist. We have a restored spelling in clerk, though educated people pronounce the word as it was once written
Clarke, or he that readeth distinctly, clericus." (Holyoak's Lat. Dict., 1612.)
In many cases we are unable to say exactly what is the ocpupation indicated. We may assume that a Setter and a Tipper did setting and tipping, and both are said to have been concerned in the arrow industry. If this is true, I should say that Setter might represent the Old Fr, saieteur, arrow-maker, from saiete, an arrow, Lat. sagitta. But in a medieval vocabulary we find "setter of mes, dapifer," which would make it the same as Sewer (Chapter XV). Similarly, when we consider the number of objects that can be tipped, we shall be shy of defining the activity of the Tipper too closely. Trinder, earlier trenden, is from Mid. Eng. trender, to roll (cf. Roller). In the west country trinder now means specifically a wool-winder—
"Lat hym rollen and trenden withynne hymself the lyght of his ynwarde sighte" (Boece, 1043).
There are also some names of this class to which we can with certainty attribute two or more origins. Boulter means a maker of bolts for crossbows, [Footnote: How many people who use the expression "bolt upright," associate it with "straight as a dart"?] but also a sifter, from the obsolete verb to bolt—
"The fanned snow, that's bolted
By the northern blasts twice o'er."
(Winter's Tale, iv. 3.)