A costermonger sells fruit and vegetables, usually from a barrow. Which particular item did a costermonger originally sell?
Costermonger hucster [=huckster], with a costardemonger and an hostler." The derivation of the term, costermonger, is mentioned in Samuel Johnson's "Dictionary of the English language," published in 1759. Charles Knight's "London", published in 1851, also notes that a costermonger was originally an apple-seller. Although the original meaning of "costermonger" applied to itinerant apple-sellers, it gradually came to refer to anyone who sold fresh fruit or vegetables from a basket, hand cart or temporary stall. The term can be used to describe anyone who sells goods outdoors or in the streets and has come to be a synonym for "street vendor". Most
Costermonger contemporary dictionary definitions of costermonger refer to them as retail sellers or street vendors of fresh produce, operating from temporary stalls or baskets or barrows which are either taken on regular routes for door-to-door selling or which are set up in high traffic areas such as informal markets or lining the streets of busy thoroughfares. The "Merriam-Webster Dictionary" defines a costermonger as "a person who sells fruit and vegetables outside rather than in a store" while the "Collins Dictionary" defines a costermonger as "a person who sells fruit or vegetables from a cart or street stand. Henry Mayhew, a Victorian