magnetizer

English

Etymology

From magnetize +‎ -er.

Noun

magnetizer (plural magnetizers)

1. (now historical) A practitioner of animal magnetism; a hypnotist. [from 18th c.]
   • 1791 (date written), Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: With Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects, 1st American edition, Boston, Mass.: […] Peter Edes for Thomas and Andrews, […], published 1792, →OCLC:

     From these delusions to those still more fashionable deceptions, practised by the whole tribe of magnetisers, the transition is very natural.

   • 1845, Bagg on Magnetism: Or the Doctrine of Equilibrium:

     Many times a whole audience will not only be crowded into a small room, but are noisy disbelievers, call it all a humbug, distract the mind of the magnetizer, and added to these, absolutely outwill the magnetizer, in their wish to bring odium upon the science, and carry their points and gain their ends.

   • 1936, Rollo Ahmed, The Black Art, London: Long, page 142:

     Mesmer had about a hundred people whom he had instructed as magnetisers, some of whom belonged to the nobility, who also "mesmerised" people by making passes over the affected parts of the body.

2. Someone or something that imparts magnetism. [from 19th c.]