English edit

Noun edit

preoccupier (plural preoccupiers)

  1. A previous occupant.
    • 1746, The London Magazine, and Monthly Chronologer, page 622:
      Like our Preoccupiers, the Antient[sic] Britons, the Indians perform all religious Ceremonies and Mysteries in the deepest Retreat of the Woods; []
    • 1839, John Towers, The Domestic Gardener's Manual, page 154:
      The surface-ground was in tolerably good heart — it had been used and manured for vegetable crops; but the sub-soil was wholly artificial, the preoccupier of the spot having converted a saw-yard and timber premises into a garden []