Etymology 1
From mull (“to heat and spice, etc.”, verb) + -er (suffix forming agent nouns).[1][2]
Noun
muller (plural mullers)
- One who, or that which, mulls.
- A person who mulls wine or other alcoholic beverages.
- A vessel in which wine, etc., is mulled over a fire.
Translations
one who, or that which, mulls
person who mulls wine or other alcoholic beverages
vessel in which wine, etc., is mulled over a fire
Etymology 2
From mull (“to mix (clay and sand) under a roller to prepare a mould”) + -er (suffix forming agent nouns).[3] Mull is possibly derived from mull (“(chiefly Northern England) to grind to powder, crumble, powder, pulverize”), from Middle English mollen, mullen (“to moisten (something); to soften (something) by making wet; to become liquid; to drizzle; to crumble or soften (something) by grinding; to fondle or pet (something)”),[4] from Old French moillier, muillier (“to make wet”) (modern French mouiller), and from its etymon Vulgar Latin *molliāre, *mulliāre (“to make wet”), from Latin molliāre, the present active infinitive of molliō (“to soften”), from Latin mollis (“soft”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(s)meld- (“to melt; to soften”) or *melh₂- (“to crush, grind”)) + -iō (suffix forming factitive verbs from adjectives).
Etymology 3
The noun is derived from Late Middle English molour, moler;[5] further origin uncertain, possibly:[6]
- from mull (“(Northern England) something reduced to fine particles”, noun)[7] or mull (“(chiefly Northern England) to grind to powder, crumble, powder, pulverize”, verb) + -er (suffix forming agent nouns) (see etymology 2); or
- from an unattested Anglo-Norman or Middle French noun, from Old French moldre, moudre (“to grind”) (modern French moudre), from Latin molere, the present active infinitive of molō (“to grind, to mill”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *melh₂- (“to crush, grind”); or
- a variant of mullet (“(obsolete) stone for grinding”) + -er; mullet is derived from French molette (“pestle”).[8]
The verb is derived from the noun.[9]
Noun
muller (plural mullers)
- (chiefly art, pharmacy) A stone with a flat grinding surface, which is held in the hand and rubbed on a slab to grind paint pigments, medicinal powders, etc.
1994, John Wilder Tukey, David R. Brillinger, The collected works of John W. Tukey, →ISBN, page 607:The muller provides, in addition, a useful means of comparing the important property of the rate of strength development of pigments.
- (by extension) A device used for crushing or grinding.
Translations
stone with a flat grinding surface held in the hand and rubbed on a slab
device used for crushing or grinding
Verb
muller (third-person singular simple present mullers, present participle mullering, simple past and past participle mullered)
- (transitive, obsolete, rare) To grind up (something) into, or as if into, powder.
- 1848, On Lucifer Matches, in the Pharmaceutical Journal, volume 7 (1847-8), page 523:
- The mixing is conducted in a water-bath, and during this process, and as long as the phosphorus is being ground or ‘mullered,’ copious fumes are evolved.
Etymology 4
Probably from Angloromani mul-, the preterite stem of mer- (“to die”) (compare mullered, mullo (“dead”, adjective);[10] ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *mer- (“to die; to disappear”)) + English -er (suffix forming frequentative verbs).[11]
Verb
muller (third-person singular simple present mullers, present participle mullering, simple past and past participle mullered) (transitive, UK, slang)
- To destroy (something); to ruin, to wreck.
- To beat or thrash (someone).
1990, Pete Davies, “All Played Out: England–Ireland”, in All Played Out: The Full Story of Italia ’90, London: Mandarin Paperbacks, published 1991, →ISBN, page 235:We walked down to the golf club to get a beer; they readily agreed as we went, it had been a dreadful game. Macca [Steve McMahon] asked Gazza [Paul Gascoigne], had he heard? – they were getting ‘mullered’ back home. […] Gazza said he wasn’t surprised, it was fair enough – and Macca said the same. He said he didn’t mind getting trashed, when they’d played a lousy game – what he hated was getting trashed for two weeks solid beforehand, when the Cup hadn’t even started.
2006, Jez Butterworth, The Winterling, →ISBN, page 39:Sure enough, they've got mullered. They're yesterday's men. The sands of time have washed over them.
2007, Stephen Cole, Thieves Like Us, page 220:Then there were these zombie cult people in the beds, wires and stuff shoved into them, and then Yianna had these two minders and they were the ones who mullered us in Cairo, I swear, and one of them grabbed Con […]
2012, Anthony Cronshaw, Wednesday Rucks and Rock 'n' Roll: Tales from the East Bank:The boys couldn't stand idly by while three Wednesdayites got mullered; it was not the done thing.
- (often sports) To utterly defeat or outplay (a sportsperson, a team, etc.); to destroy, to thrash, to trounce.
- Synonym: outclass
Translations
to utterly defeat or outplay (a sportsperson, a team, etc.)
— see thrash,
trounce
Etymology 5
Borrowed from German Müller, the surname of Franz Müller (1840–1864), a German tailor who was convicted and hanged for the robbery and murder of Thomas Briggs, a British banker, on a train. Müller was found in possession of, among other things, Briggs’ top hat, which he had altered by reducing the height of the crown by half and resewing it to the brim.[12][13]
References
Yaron Matras (2010) “Appendix I: Lexicon of Angloromani”, in Romani in Britain: The Afterlife of a Language, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, →ISBN, page 185; see also Charles G[odfrey] Leland (1873) “Gipsy Words which have Passed into English Slang”, in The English Gipsies and Their Language, London: Trübner & Co., […], →OCLC, page 94: “‘To make a Mull of anything,’ meaning thereby to spoil or confuse it, if it be derived, as is said, from the Gipsy, must have come from Mullo meaning dead, and the Sanskrit Mara.”
W[illia]m H. Peet (1902 October 25) “[Replies.] Fashion in Language.”, in Notes and Queries: A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, General Readers, etc., volume X (9th Series), London: John C[ollins] Francis, →OCLC, page 337, column 1:The term “Muller,” or “Muller-cut-down,” applied to a hat, referred to an incident connected with the murder of Mr. Briggs in a railway carriage on 9 July, 1864. The murderer was Franz Müller, and the fact that he was found with his victim’s hat was the most damning piece of evidence against him. The hat had been specially made for Mr. Briggs, but Müller had had it cut down in a way that was common in the second-hand hat trade. For some years after a low hat was spoken of as a “Muller-cut-down,” or a man was spoken of as having had his hat “mullered.”
Further reading
- Joseph Wright, editor (1903), “MULLER, sb.1; v. and sb.2”, in The English Dialect Dictionary: […], volume IV (M–Q), London: Henry Frowde, […], publisher to the English Dialect Society, […]; New York, N.Y.: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam’s Sons, →OCLC, page 197, column 2.