c1390 (a1376) W. Langland Piers Plowman (Vernon) (1867) A. x. l. 102 (MED) Walkers..walken A-bouten From Religion to Religion, Recheles ben þei euere.

c1450 ( J. Walton tr. Boethius De Consol. Philos. (Linc. Cathedral 103) 224 (MED) He þat on his feet may goon..Till þat he fynde þat forþer is no way, Þat man a myghti walkere wilt þou deme.

1578 H. Wotton tr. J. Yver Courtlie Controuersie 300 Hee..conducted them vnto the place where the collation was prepared for the walkers.

1596 E. Spenser Second Pt. Faerie Queene iv. x. sig. K^v And shadie seates, and sundry flowring bankes, To sit and rest the walkers wearie shankes. View more context for this quotation

1653 W. Ramesey Astrologia Restaurata 193 If the walker go to visit any one,..he shall meet the party.

1713 R. Steele in Guardian 18 Mar. 2/1 He gives Plates for the best performing Horse..for him that trots best,..for the best Walker, [etc.].

1786 J. Reynolds Disc. Royal Acad. 27 The forms and turnings of the streets..are produced by accident, without any original plan or design: but they are not always the less pleasant to the walker or spectator, on that account.

1815 W. Scott Guy Mannering III. xiii. 260 The cool breeze served only to freshen, not to chill, the fair walkers.

1858 M. A. Paul Maiden Sisters xxiii. 210 I am the worst walker of the three, and I am not the least tired.

1880 M. E. Braddon Just as I Am xxiii She was an excellent walker.

1919 Outing Mar. 298/2 If you are a brisk walker and follow the Long Trail sign posts, the evening dusk of a day's hike south from the top of Mansfield will probably find you just drawing above the timber line of Camel's Hump.

1937 P. Gosse Traveller's Rest i. 12 I feel truly sorry for the real walker. I mean the town or city man or woman who goes for the day into the country to walk.

2006 Scots Mag. June 572/2 The trails..will allow walkers, horse-riders and cyclists to follow in the historic footsteps of cattle drovers and reivers.

1567 T. Harman Caueat for Commen Cursetors (new ed.) sig. F.iiii The arche & chief walkers y^t hath walked a long time, whose experience is great because of their continuing practise, I meane all Morts & Doxes for their handsomnes and diligence for making of their couches.

1842 Chambers's Information for People (new ed.) I. 244/2 The last..class in Ireland, is that of the common vagrant. Of these, some are beggars by profession; some are obliged, from loss of employment, to become what are called walkers; and others are mendicants for a time only.

1850 M. A. Denham Pop. Rhymes Isle of Man in Tracts (1892) I. 193 It is customary for these walkers, as they are called, to enter a house without knocking, and take a seat by the fire... Some still retain the good old custom of keeping up a bed for the walker.

1779 Ann. Reg. 1778 210 Mr. Powell, the noted walker, started from Lee-Bridge, to run two miles in ten minutes.

1826 Blackwood's Edinb. Mag. Aug. 136/1 A first-rate walker..will do—toe and heel—six miles an hour, for one hour, on a good road... The odds on such a match would, we think, be against any unknown pedestrian, 6 to 4 on time.

1884 Harper's Mag. Jan. 302/2 A walker who gives promise of great things if he doesn't walk his short legs off within the next two or three years.

1925 Morning Herald (Uniontown, Pa.) 19 Jan. 11/5 He is a champion walker and holds the world's record for the 10 kilometer distance, 47:49 seconds.

1995 N.Y. Outdoors Apr. 12/2 If both feet are off..simultaneously, then the walker is considered to be ‘lifting’, an official..can issue a warning.

2002 J. Saltzman Frank Capra & Image of Journalist v. 131 John Burton..meets the leaders of his $25,000 Cross Country Walking Race... Newsreel footage of the walkers follows.

1846 G. P. R. James Step-mother II. xl. 122 ‘A walker of the Tract Society’, said Mr. Prior to himself, as he eyed him.

1482 in J. P. Collier Househ. Bks. John Duke of Norfolk & Thomas Earl of Surrey (1844) 225 Item, to the parker of Neylond xx.d. Item, to the walkeres, viij.d.

1535 Act 27 Hen. VIII c. 7 §1 Any of the said foresters rulers walkers or fermers.

1647 L. Haward Charges Crown Revenue 42 Walker about the pales of the Chace: Fee 6. 1. 8.

1706 Phillips's New World of Words (new ed.) Walkers, a sort of Forest-Officers appointed by the King or Queen, to walk about a certain space of Ground committed to their Care.

1781 M. J. Armstrong Hist. & Antiq. Norfolk V. 108 Lord Marny..had also..4l. 11s. 3d. per ann. as ranger of the chace, and 53s. 4d. per ann. for two under foresters, or walkers.

1961 W. T. MacCaffrey in D. T. Bindoff et al. Elizabethan Govt. & Soc. 123 Supervising these scattered properties was a host of stewards, bailiffs, foresters, porters, constables, walkers, palers, or keepers.

1613 T. Middleton Manner his Lordship's Entertainm. 3 in Triumphs Truth (new issue) First here's the Ouer-seer... The Labourers next, Keeper of Amwell-head, The Walkers last.

1702 N. Luttrell Diary 26 Nov. in J. Ashton Social Life Reign of Queen Anne (1883) v. 54 12 Walkers between Ware and London (who daily take care that no Infectious or other thing be thrown into the River that might in any way prejudice it).

?1515 Hyckescorner (de Worde) sig. A.viii Walkers by nyght.

1542 T. Elyot Bibliotheca Neurobatæ, walkers on cordes or ropes.

1587 Sir P. Sidney & A. Golding tr. P. de Mornay Trewnesse Christian Relig. iii. 44 Calling him the euerlasting Father, the Walker vpon the Heauen of Heauens.

c1600 (?c1395) Pierce Ploughman's Crede (Trin. Cambr. R.3.15) (1873) l. 89 He [sc. Paul] seyde..‘Wepyng, y warne ȝow of walkers aboute’.

a1630 F. Moryson in Shakespeare's Europe (1903) v. iii. 476 Not to speake of frequent spectacles in London exhibited to the people by Fencers, by walkers on Ropes, and like men of actiuity.

1642 E. Dering Coll. Speeches on Relig. i. 2 So said one of the usuall blacke walkers in Westminster Hall. Another of our Parliament-pressing Ministers..told me plainely, That my conscience was not so good as in the beginning of the Parliament.

1796 F. Burney Camilla III. vi. iii. 171 Mr. Dennel took up the Daily Advertiser; his daughter stationed herself at the door to see the walkers upon the Pantiles.

1866 R. S. Candlish 1st Epist. John viii. 80 He was no privileged walker amid earth's dark scenes of misery and sin.

1922 Times 17 Apr. 7/1 Walkers over the hills and commons met the wind in full force, but returned home with glowing faces and healthy appetites.

1962 E. Sams Songs of Hugo Wolf vii. 234 The listener is wholly caught up..with the lone walker in the night, singing and playing his songs of love and longing.

2008 Jrnl. (Newcastle) 2 Feb. 38 Originally we were just dealing with missing walkers in the hills but now we get calls to incidents in urban areas.

1611 Bible (King James) Judges v. 6 The traueilers [margin. walkers of paths] walked thorow by-wayes. View more context for this quotation

1788 Times 27 May 3/1 The walker of the deck severely trimmed the perambulator of the Rotunda, to the no small amusement of the spectators.

1836 C. Dickens Sketches by Boz 1st Ser. I. 153 A poetical walker of the hospitals.

1857 J. G. Holland Bay-path x. 124 She looked down before her, and saw a staff that some walker of the woods had cut and trimmed.

1971 J. Gardner Grendel i. 7 Such are the tiresome memories of a shadow-shooter, earth-rim-roamer, walker of the world's weird wall.

1996 P. I. Barta Bely, Joyce & Döblin i. 11 Walter Benjamin's own experience suggests that being a walker of the city can be an unpleasant result of modern urban deprivation and homelessness.

2004 D. M. Carroll Self-portrait with Turtles (2005) 67 I went from being a wader of turtled swamps and marshes to being a walker of peopled streets and buildings.

1876 ‘V. Fane’ Queen of Fairies iv. 63 Women who were young and beautiful And indigent, would often ask to stand—Unable or to sing or dance or act, Mere ‘walkers on’ upon the London stage—Disguised as flowers, or butterflies, or fish, Or flutt'ring fairies, in some mad burlesque Or Christmas pantomime.

1897 G. B. Shaw in Sat. Rev. 16 Oct. 418/1 A good deal of the technique acquired by American actors no doubt makes one almost long for the fatuous complacency of the British ‘walker-on’.

1936 N. Streatfeild Ballet Shoes xiv. 212 Pauline and Petrova were, of course, principals, and as such separated from the ballet and walkers-on.

1948 ‘N. Shute’ No Highway iv. 92 In Hollywood beauties were two a penny, and it was years before she got an inkling what it was that differentiated her from all the stand-ins and walkers-on.

1977 Times 19 Oct. 11/6 When some walkers-on failed to arrive for Coppelia two of her Majesty's sailors were seized by a pressgang, squeezed into tights and sent on stage.

1658 J. Rowland tr. T. Moffett Theater of Insects in Topsell's Hist. Four-footed Beasts (rev. ed.) 1035 Now we proceed to walkers about. We call those walkers, who have no certain houses or food:..wherefore the English call them Palmer-worms, namely for their wandring life, for they dwell no where.

1813 J. M. Good et al. Pantologia at Ornithology § ii Among the walkers this membrane is not to be found.

1817 W. Kirby & W. Spence Introd. Entomol. II. xxii. 277 The next order of walkers amongst apodous larvæ are those that move by means of fleshy tuberculiform or pediform prominences.

1872 E. Coues Key to N. Amer. Birds 44 It is among the Cursores, or walkers, and especially wading birds, that the crus is most naked.

1894 R. B. Sharpe Hand-bk. Birds Great Brit. I. 4 Nearly all the Crows are ‘Ambulatores’ or ‘Walkers’, that is to say, they do not hop.

1921 F. S. Mathews Field Bk. Wild Birds & their Music (rev. ed.) 301 Like the Ovenbird the Water-thrushes are walkers—not hoppers.

1998 B. Schorre Wood Warblers 25 Birds of the genus Seiurus (the Ovenbird and the water-thrushes) are walkers and get about with a teetering gait.

1876 A. Macalister Introd. Animal Morphol.: Invertebrata xlvii. 403 Orthoptera... This polymorphic group includes the following sections and families:..§2. Gressoria, walkers.

1891 Cent. Dict. Walker,..pl. the ambulatory orthopterous insects of the family Phasmidæ; the phasmids or walking-sticks.

1902 L. O. Howard Insect Bk. 323 The family constitutes the section of Orthopterous insects known to the old naturalists as Gressoria or walkers.

1904 Manitoba Morning Free Press 4 Nov. 9/3 (advt.) No chance of your baby becoming bow-legged if you buy one of these walkers.

1934 in Webster's New Internat. Dict. Eng. Lang. Walker, a form of child's gocart designed to accustom the child to walking.

1971 E. Afr. Standard (Nairobi) 13 Apr. 14/1 (advt.) Children's bicycles, walkers, car-seats and play-pens at Cycle Mart and Exchange Ltd.

2005 FQ July 35/1 This push-along walker can be filled with toys and also has a removable cot so that dolly can hitch a ride as well.

1941 F. H. Krusen Physical Med. xvi. 648 Various types of walkers..will give the patient firm support through the arms and axillae when he is taking his first hesitant steps.

1971 Catholic Worker May 2/3 She is living at Loretto Home for the Aged..and must use a walker since she broke her hip some time ago.

1980 U. Curtiss Poisoned Orchard ii. 12 She's in her seventies and in a walker.

2002 N.Y. Times (National ed.) 1 Sept. viii. 3/6 Thompson started out in a wheelchair, then moved on to a walker and crutches and, finally, to walking without aid.