Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A case with shelves or any other device in which plates are held before a fire, over a hot-air register, etc., to be warmed.
  • noun A hollow metallic tray, of the size and form of a plate, filled with hot water and placed at table beneath a dinnerplate to keep it warm.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • But the little rubicund old bachelor with a pigtail, whose portrait was over the sideboard (and who could easily be identified as decidedly Pebbleson and decidedly not Nephew), had retired into another sarcophagus, and the plate-warmer had grown as cold as he.

    No Thoroughfare 2007

  • Under the sideboard stands a cellaret that looks as if it held half a bottle of currant wine, and a shivering plate-warmer that never could get any comfort out of the wretched old cramped grate yonder.

    Mens Wives 2006

  • Inside the high fender the hearth had been freshly holy stoned and Gran's old plate-warmer still stood there, a curious affair of turned wood, like a giant caltrop.

    Rose cottage Stewart, Mary, 1916- 1997

  • Inside the high fender the hearth had been freshly holy stoned and Gran's old plate-warmer still stood there, a curious affair of turned wood, like a giant caltrop.

    Rose cottage Stewart, Mary, 1916- 1997

  • With these would be served either four or six dishes of vegetables and scalloped oysters, handed hot from the plate-warmer.

    Plantation Sketches Margaret Devereux

  • The ordinary plate-warmer is now superseded by something far better, in which a hot brick is introduced.

    Manners and Social Usages Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood

  • The silver dishes should be heated by hot water in the kitchen, the hot dinner plates must be forthcoming from the plate-warmer, nor must the roasts or

    Manners and Social Usages Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood

  • How fond we were of one another, when she did come out at last; and what a state of bliss I was in, when we took Jip out of the plate-warmer, and restored him to the light, sneezing very much, and were all three reunited!

    David Copperfield Dickens, Charles, 1812-1870 1917

  • There I found my blessed darling stopping her ears behind the door, with her dear little face against the wall; and Jip in the plate-warmer with his head tied up in a towel.

    David Copperfield Dickens, Charles, 1812-1870 1917

  • He would sometimes think he had got the better of his objection, and be amiable for a few minutes; and then would put up his snub nose, and howl to that extent, that there was nothing for it but to blind him and put him in the plate-warmer.

    David Copperfield Dickens, Charles, 1812-1870 1917

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