provender

From Middle English provendre, from Old French provendre, variant of provende (“allowance, provision”), from Late Latin praebenda (“a payment, in Medieval Latin also an allowance of food and drink, pittance, also a prebend”). Doublet of prebend.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈpɹɒvɪndə/, /ˈpɹɒvəndə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈpɹɑvəndɚ/

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provender (usually uncountable, plural provenders)

1. (dated) Food, especially for livestock.

   Synonyms: fodder; see also Thesaurus:food

   • 1859, George Meredith, chapter 12, in The Ordeal of Richard Feverel. A History of Father and Son. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC:

     The farm which supplied to him ungrudging provender had all his vast capacity for work in willing exercise …

   • 1662, [Samuel Butler], “[The First Part of Hudibras]”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678, →OCLC; republished in A[lfred] R[ayney] Waller, editor, Hudibras: Written in the Time of the Late Wars, Cambridge: University Press, 1905, →OCLC, canto CANTO 2:

     He ripp'd the womb up of his mother, / Dame Tellus, 'cause he wanted fother, / And provender, wherewith to feed / Himself and his less cruel steed.

   • 1952, Norman Lewis, Golden Earth:

     Irregular, sporadic feeding and strange provender were beginning to take their toll, and I felt queasy at the thought of 'various curries' the Amat's clerk had promised for the first meal of the day.

   • 1954, J. R. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, Chapter I, A long-expected party:

     (...) hobbits were easy-going with their children in the matter of sitting up late, especially when there was a chance of getting them a free meal. Bringing up young hobbits took a lot of provender.

provender (third-person singular simple present provenders, present participle provendering, simple past and past participle provendered)

1. (transitive) To feed.
   • 1911, International Horseshoers' Monthly Magazine, volume 12, page 35:

     One night, after several days of continuous plowing, and after the ox and mule had been stabled and provendered for the night, the ox said to the mule […]

• “provender”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “provender”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.