livery1

 
Pronunciation: /ˈlɪv(ə)ri/

noun (plural liveries)

  • 1a special uniform worn by a servant, an official, or a member of a City Company: yeomen of the guard wearing a royal red and gold livery [mass noun]: pageboys in scarlet and green livery
  • a special design and colour scheme used on the vehicles, aircraft, or products of a particular company: the city’s trams are painted in a red and white livery
  • 3(in the UK) the members of a City livery company collectively.
  • 4 historical a provision of food or clothing for servants.
  • 5 (in full livery of seisin) British historical the ceremonial procedure at common law of conveying freehold land to a grantee.

Phrases

at livery

(of a horse) kept for the owner and fed and cared for at a fixed charge.

Derivatives

liveried

adjective
livery1 (sense 1).

Origin:

Middle English: from Old French livree 'delivered', feminine past participle of livrer, from Latin liberare 'liberate' (in medieval Latin 'hand over'). The original sense was 'the dispensing of food, provisions, or clothing to servants'; hence livery1 (sense 4), also 'allowance of provender for horses', surviving in the phrase at livery and in livery stable. livery1 (sense 1) arose because medieval nobles provided matching clothes to distinguish their servants from others'