LIVERY, in matters of dress and equipage, a certain colour and form of dress, by which noblemen and gentlemen choose to distinguish their servants. Liveries are usually taken from fancy, or continued in families by succession. The ancient cavaliers, at their tournaments, distinguished themselves by wearing the liveries of their mistresses. Thus people of quality make their domestics wear their livery. Father Menestrier, in his Treatise of Carousals, has given a very ample account of the mixtures of colours in liveries. Dion tells us that Oenomaus was the first who invented green and blue colours for the troops which, in the circus, were to represent land and sea fights. The Roman Catholic church has also her several colours and liveries; white, for confessors and virgins, and in times of rejoicing; black, for the dead; red, for the apostles and martyrs; blue or violet, for penitents; and green, in times of hope. Formerly, great men gave liveries to several who were not of their family or servants, in order to engage them in their quarrels for that year.
LIVERYMEN of London, are a number of men chosen from amongst the freemen of each company. Out of this
body the common council, sheriff, and other superior officers for the government of the city, are elected; and until the passing of the reform act they alone had the privilege of giving their votes for members of parliament, from which the rest of the citizens were excluded. See LONDON.