waiter

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A male or female attendant who serves customers at their tables in a restaurant, café or similar.

   Waiter! There's a fly in my soup.

2. 2
   noun

   Someone who waits for somebody or something; a person who is waiting.

   However, the NTPF also contained implicit negative incentives for the public sector by offering alternative private sector treatment for the longest waiters at no extra cost to patients or no penalty to public providers.

3. 3
   noun

   A vessel or tray on which something is carried, as dishes, etc.; a salver. (See etymology of dumbwaiter.)

   Cautioning her, in these terms, not to trip over a heterogeneous litter of pastry-cook’s trays, lamps, waiters full of glasses, and piles of rout seats which were strewn about the hall, plainly bespeaking a late party on the previous night, the man led the way to the second story […]

4. 4
   verb

   To work as a waiter.

   I had definitely had my fill of factory jobs, but had never worked in an office, nor bussed, nor waitered.

5. 5
   noun

   a person whose occupation is to serve at table (as in a restaurant)

6. 6
   noun

   a person who waits or awaits

7. 7
   noun

   A person working as an attendant at the London Stock Exchange.

8. 8
   noun

   A custom house officer; a tide waiter.

Etymology

From late 14th century Middle English waiter, wayter (“attendant, watchman”). By surface analysis, wait + -er. Sense of "servant who waits at tables" is from late 15th century, originally in reference to household servants; in reference to inns, eating houses, etc., it is attested from 1660s. Feminine form waitress first recorded 1834. The London Stock Exchange sense harks back to the early days of trading in coffee-shops.