Middle English Dictionary Entry

queller(e n.
Quotations: Show all Hide all

Entry Info

Definitions (Senses and Subsenses)

1.
(a) An executioner; also, an official tormentor or torturer; (b) a murderer.

Supplemental Materials (draft)

  • a1500(1422) Yonge SSecr.(Rwl B.490)164/11 : Nobyll and gracious lorde .. sethyn god and oure kynge haue grauntid you powere, do ye therof Execucion in opyn fals enemys, traytouris, and rebelle trewmen-quelleris, whan thay fallyth Into youre handys.
Note: Postdates sense (b). Not entirely clear how to parse the words preceding "quelleris"; the punctuation adopted here assumes that the phrase is "treumen-quellers," i.e. 'murderers of loyalists' or 'of good men'?)' (treue adj., sense 1a.(a) or one of the weaker approbatory senses); and that "rebelle" further modifies this combination, i.e., 'rebellious killers of loyalists' or 'of good men.' But "rebelle" could also be taken as an unconnected noun or adjective (to be followed by a comma); and the phrase could rather be the simpler 'men-quellers,' qualified by 'treu' in the vaguely intensifying sense of 'real, actual.' In either case, the plural 'men' is a little surprising, since such compounds usually contain a nominally plural but grammatically singular object.