boatbearer

See also: boat bearer

English

Etymology

From boat +‎ bearer.

Noun

boatbearer (plural boatbearers)

1. A clergyman who carries the incense before it is lit.
   • 1916 December 29, James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, New York, N.Y.: B[enjamin] W. Huebsch, →OCLC:

     He remembered the summer evening he had been there to be dressed as a boatbearer, the evening of the procession to the little altar in the wood.

     Macmillan Press Ltd, paperback, page 47