prester

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“
Au prester couzin germaine, au rendre fils de putaine

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Definitions (4)

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  1. A priest: often used in old writers as the title of a supposed Christian king and priest (Prester John) of a medieval kingdom. The belief in the existence of such a ruler in some undetermined part of Asia appeared in the twelfth century. From the fourteenth century the seat of the supposed Prester John was placed in Abyssinia, and this belief was held down to the close of the middle ages. In the East syde of Afrike, beneth the redde sea, dwelleth the greate and myghtye Emperour and Chrystian kynge Prester Iohan, well knowen to the Portugales in theyr vyages to Calicut. R. Eden (First Books on America, ed. Arber, p. 374). More than twenty years later, when the first book on Abyssinia was composed — that of Alvarez — the title constantly and as a matter of course designating the king of Abyssinia is “Prester John,” or simply “the Preste.” Encyc. Brit., XIX. 718.
  2. A meteor.

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Examples (8)

  • The first bitten was the standard-bearer Aulus, by a dipsas, which afflicted him with intolerable thirst; next Sabellus by a seps, a minute creature whose bite was followed by an instantaneous corruption of the whole body; [59] then Nasidius by a prester which caused his form to swell to an unrecognisable size, and so on through the list of serpents, each episode closing with a brilliant epigram which clenches the effect. —  The History of Roman Literature From the earliest period to the death of Marcus Aurelius
  • Au prester couzin germaine, au rendre fils de putaine —  Bacon is Shake-Speare
  • I am prester mast (Prestre mace, maistre passe.), Prish, Brum! —  Gargantua and Pantagruel, Illustrated, Book 1
  • Mais d'en prester, foy de marchant, encor, —  Avril Being Essays on the Poetry of the French Renaissance
  • 241.] [Footnote 560: In the preamble to the edict of Paris issued two years later, Henry rehearses the ordinance and its motives: "Et pour ceste cause dès nostre nouvel avénement à la couronne, voulans à l'exemple et imitation de feu nostredit seigneur et père, travailler et prester la main à purger et nettoier nostre royaume d'une telle peste, nous aurions pour plus grande et prompte expédition desdites matières et procez sur le fait desdites hérésies, erreurs et fausses doctrines ordonné et estably _une chambre particulière en nostre parlement à Paris, pour seulement vaquer ausdites expéditions, sans se divertir à autres actes_." —  The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2)
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Etymologies (2)

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. from Middle English prester, from Old French prestre, French prêtre, priest: see priest, presbyter.
  2. from Greek πρηστήρ, a meteor, a lightning-flash, from πρήθειν, blow up, blow up into flame.
 

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