gaffer

From gaff (“hook”) +‎ -er.

• (cinema): The natural lighting on early film sets was adjusted by opening and closing flaps in the tent cloths, called gaff cloths or gaff flaps.
• (glass): (This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ɡæfɚ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ɡæfə/

• Audio (Southern England):

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• Rhymes: -æfə(ɹ)

gaffer (plural gaffers)

1. (film) A chief lighting technician for a motion-picture or television production.
2. A glassblower.
   • 2003, Jennifer Bosveld, Glass Works, page 18:

     The apprentice carries a gather of glass on the blowpipe to the gaffer's bench […]

3. Someone aboard a boat whose duty is to gaff a (large) fish once the angler has reeled it in.

• gaffer grip
• gaffer tape

Likely a contraction of godfather, but with the vowels influenced by grandfather. Compare French compère, German Gevatter.

Compare also Old English ġefædera (“godfather”), of which some unattested dialectal descendant may have been an influence.

gaffer (plural gaffers)

1. (colloquial) An old person, usually a man.
   • 1845, Thomas Cooper, The Purgatory of Suicides, Book the Fourth, Stanza IX:

     If thou return not, Gammer o'er her pail
     Will sing in sorrow, 'neath the brinded cow,
     And Gaffer sigh over his nut-brown ale […]

2. (UK, informal) The leader of a group or team, such as a boss, foreman, coach, or publican.
   • 2022, Liam McIlvanney, The Heretic, page 117:

     And you're here to tell me what's what. Just like your bloody gaffer promised.

3. A sailor.
4. (Canada) The baby in the house.

• See also Thesaurus:old man

• gammer

• “gaffer”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989.

• Graeff

From gaffe +‎ -er. Sense of gaffer-taping from English gaffer tape.

• IPA^(key): /ɡa.fe/

• Audio (France (Lyon)):

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• Audio (France (Somain)):

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gaffer

1. to make a gaffe; to mess up; botch up
2. to gaffer tape

Borrowed from English gaffer.

• IPA^(key): /ɡa.fœʁ/

gaffer m (plural gaffers)

1. gaffer tape

   Alternative form: gaffeur

• “gaffer”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

• Audio (Jersey):

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gaffer

1. (Jersey) to grasp

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡafɛr/

gaffer

1. soft mutation of caffer