> as lemmas

a. Formerly (in England, Wales, and Ireland): an officer formally appointed to represent a person in a court of law; a trained member of the legal profession who has been admitted to practise in the courts of common law, as contrasted with solicitors, proctors, etc., who practise in other courts; spec. a lawyer who prepares cases to be argued by a barrister or counsellor in a court of common law. Sometimes more fully public attorney. Now historical. Cf. proctor n.¹ 4, solicitor n. 3a.Used with negative connotations of deceptiveness and greed from an early period (see quots. a1450 and a1538).This sense only became fully distinct from sense 2a over the passage of time, as a body of professional legal agents was recognized and incorporated. The title was abolished by the Judicature Act of 1873 (cf. quot. 1873).