claqueur

plural claqueurs

1. historicalA member of the claque employed to applaud during a theatre performance.

   “Many a clever fellow fails through life, because the silly fellows, whom half a word well spoken could make his claqueurs, turn him into ridicule. Whatever you are, avoid the fault of most reading men: in a word, don’t be a prig!”

   1853, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, chapter XXI, in My Novel

   1 more example

   One hundred and fifty “iron-handed” Vienna theatre claqueurs today formed a trade union, probably the first of its kind in the world. […] The most popular singers have been obliged to give free tickets and even to donate cash, lest the claque retaliate by frantic applause at the wrong moment.

   1930 February 23, “Theatre Claqueurs in Vienna Form Union”, in The New York Times, →ISSN