/ · 1894 Brewer’s · G · Green Man
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This public-house sign represents the gamekeeper, who used at one time to be dressed in green.
“But the ‘Green Man shall I pass by unsung,
Which mine own James upon his sign-post hung?
His sign, his image—for he once was seen
A squire’s attendant, clad in keeper’s green.”
Crabbe: Borough.
The men who let off fireworks were called Green-men in the reign of James I.
“Have you any squibs, any green-man in your shows?”—The Seven Champions of Christendom.
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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.
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