the.com/cordwainer
A shoemaker who makes new shoes from fresh leather, not a cobbler who patches old ones.
means A craftsman who makes shoes and other goods from new leather, as distinguished historically from a cobbler, who only repaired old footwear.
from Traces back to 'cordwain' or 'cordovan,' the fine goatskin leather originally produced in Córdoba, Spain, under Moorish craftsmanship. The word passed into French as 'cordouan' and then into English as 'cordwainer' — literally one who works in Cordovan leather. The trade guilds that formed around this word guarded it fiercely: cordwainers worked costly new hides, while lowly cobblers, forbidden by guild law from buying new leather at all, could only stitch and patch what was already worn.
- name origin
- From Cordovan leather, originally from Córdoba, Spain
- guild status
- Had its own powerful medieval trade guild
- cobbler distinction
- Cobblers were historically banned from using new leather
- modern survival
- Mostly lives on as a surname now