purveyor

noun

Etymology: From Middle English purveiour (“one who procures or supplies necessities, provider; city, military, religious, or household employee in charge of provisions, steward; one in charge, overseer; one who goes ahead to prepare the way, forerunner; one who arranges accommodations for a traveller; (figurative) one who gathers greedily”), from Anglo-Norman purveour, Middle French pourveur, pourvoyeur, and (chiefly Northern) Old French purveour (“one who procures or supplies necessities or things in general; one who arranges or prepares something”) (modern French pourvoyeur), from porveoir, purveer, purveir (“to equip, furnish, provide, purvey; to foresee; to look at; to obtain, procure”) (modern French pourvoir) + -or (suffix forming agent nouns). Porveoir is derived from Latin prōvidēre, the present active infinitive of prōvideō (“to care for, look after; to foresee; to provide, see to”), from prō- (prefix meaning ‘before; forward’) + videō (“to see; to look out for, care for, provide, see to”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *weyd- (“to see”)). By surface analysis, purvey + -or (suffix forming agent nouns denoting people or things which do the actions denoted by the stems). Doublet of proveditor and provedore.

1. One who purveys (“furnishes, provides; gets, procures”); a supplier; specifically, one in the business of supplying food or other necessary material goods; a provisioner.

   “The merchants are the purveyors of fine selections.”

   “I love the Sea; She is my fellovv-Creature; / My carefull Purveyor; She provides me ſtore; / She vvals me round; She makes my diet greater; / She vvafts my treaſure from a forreigne ſhore; […]”

2. One who purveys (“furnishes, provides; gets, procures”); a supplier; specifically, one in the business of supplying food or other necessary material goods; a provisioner.

   “groom purveyor    yeoman purveyor”

   “Let therfore firſt and principall care be for competent prouiſion of victuall, namely bread corne, the vſe wherof is ſeene to be farre more neceſſary, then any other thinge and let there bee made three Purueyghours, or principall victuallers, to haue the ouerſighte, and ſurueighe of all victual, and make prouiſion of the ſame accordinglye: […]”

3. A person or group that promotes or spreads an idea, a viewpoint, etc.

   “purveyors of false information”

4. One who arranges or prepares something; an arranger, an orchestrator, a preparer.

   “That certayn servantes of sir Fraunces Knowles [Francis Knollys?] and other [resorting to his lectures] fell owte amonge themselfes, and were lyke to have commytted murther, and therefore he was suer of sedition and prevyer of unlawfull assemblies.”