valet-de-place
English edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from French [Term?].
Noun edit
valet-de-place (plural valets-de-place)
- (historical) In France, a person who offered his services as a guide, messenger, etc. for hire, especially to strangers.
- 1792, Charlotte Smith, Desmond, Broadview, published 2001, page 383:
- I therefore added to my own English servants […] a Frenchman, who had formerly served me as valet de place, and of whom I had a very good opinion.