Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)
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First published 1952 (SND Vol. III).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.
Quotation dates: 1824-1909
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CUSTOMER, n. Used attrib. in combs.: 1. customer tailor, a travelling tailor working for private customers; 2. customer wark (work), private orders as opposed to work done for a factory; 3. customer weaver, a weaver who works for private customers. All now only hist.1. Sc. 1909 Colville 188:
All over Old Scotland the "customer" tailor, working for customers, was known as Whip-the-Cat.2. Sc. 1824 R. Chambers Poet. Remains (1883) 18:
Yet canty's the wabster, and blyth as a lark, Whene'er he gets what he ca's customer-wark!Sc. 1832 Chambers's Edb. Jnl. I. 276/4:
When customer work failed, he [the weaver] was fain to work a piece upon speculation.Slk. 1886 T. Craig-Brown Hist. Selkirkshire II. 179:
As yet [1817] there was no factory of any consequence in the town [Selkirk], the weavers for the most part living in poor houses of their own, earning a precarious living from what was called "customer wark."3. Sc. 1832 Chambers's Edb. Jnl. I. 276/3:
There are now very few customer weavers, as they are called, who can obtain full employment.Sc. 1867 N. Macleod Starling I. ii.:
Ane o' them . . . made a stramash atween . . . our Auld Licht minister, and . . . the Customer Weaver.
