footman
part of speech
noun (a footman, footmen)
meaning for a pupil
1) A male servant in a grand house who wears a uniform, opens doors, serves food at table and carries messages. tree →
2) In Alice in Wonderland, the Fish-Footman brings the Duchess an invitation from the Queen to play croquet, and the Frog-Footman takes it; both wear powdered wigs. tree →
sense in the lessons
Footmen worked in large houses and palaces in the past and still work at Buckingham Palace today. In history lessons they show how rich families lived with many servants. In Alice, the Frog-Footman sits outside the Duchess's door and talks nonsense, saying he will sit there «till tomorrow», which shows how silly rules and manners can be.
examples
- The footman opened the carriage door for the Queen. tree →
- The Fish-Footman handed over a letter almost as large as himself. tree →
- The Frog-Footman sat staring stupidly up at the sky. tree →
- In the big house, footmen served dinner in white gloves. tree →
- The footman bowed and carried in the silver tray. tree →
- Alice knocked, but the footman would not let her in. tree →
- The two footmen got their curls tangled together when they bowed. tree →
- But on the way back the coachman and footman spoke to one another and said: tree →
note
Plural footmen. It is a job of the past (and of royal palaces), not a man who walks. Do not confuse with foot soldier.
In the corpora
- The Fish-Footman brings a letter "nearly as large as himself": "For the Duchess.
- The Frog-Footman repeats it "only changing the order of the words a little": "From the Queen.
- And Saul summoned the people, and numbered them in Telaim, two hundred thousand footmen, and ten thousand men of Judah.
- 'If thou hast run with the footmen, and they have wearied thee, then how canst thou contend with horses?
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «footman» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.