misliver

English

Etymology

From Middle English myslyver, equivalent to mislive +‎ -er.

Noun

misliver (plural mislivers)

1. (archaic) One who leads an evil or sinful life.
   • 1528 October 12 (Gregorian calendar), William Tyndale, “A Compendious Rehersall of That Which Goeth Before”, in The Obediẽce of a Christen Man […], [Antwerp: Johannes Hoochstraten], →OCLC, folio Cliij, recto:

     And as the huſbande ys heed over his wife: even ſo hath he commaundmente to rule hyr appetites and is damned yf he ſofre hyr to be an whore ãd a miſſe lyver / oꝛ ſubmit hymſelfe to hyr and make hir his heed.

   • 2017, Martin Ingram, Carnal Knowledge: Regulating Sex in England, 1470–1600, page 275:

     Yet the bishops who responded to the Commons' Supplication, while acutely sensitive in general to any assault on 'the laws of the church for repression of sin and reformation of 'mislivers', hardly seem to have appreciated the potential effects of this particular line of attack, blandly observing that 'a better provision cannot be devised than is already devised by the clergy, in our opinion.