man Friday

plural man Fridays · plural men Friday · plural men Fridays

1. A trusted man whose job is to assist and organize someone else's day-to-day business or personal tasks; a personal assistant, a right-hand man; also, a trusted male companion.

   This man—our lackey, our servant, our unquestioning slave though he was, was still a gentleman— […] We asked our man Friday’s name.

   1869, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter XIII, in The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims’ Progress; […], Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company. […], →OCLC, page 119

   1 more example

   Nothing is less true, as far as intellectual initiative is concerned, than the idea that those who are good in obeying will also be good in commanding. Very similar difficulties arise in political parties: the ‘Man Friday’ of the party leader is seldom a capable successor.

   1945, K[arl] R[aimund] Popper, “The Principle of Leadership”, in The Open Society and Its Enemies, 4th edition, volume I (The Spell of Plato), London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, published 1962, section V, page 135

2. derogatoryethnicoffensiveslurAn aborigine or native, especially one who inhabits an island.

   Unfortunately along with the Birds go some few Tarzans or Men Fridays whose origins are obscure, and who are being hopefully wished on to Mauritius etc.

   handwritten note on a confidential diplomatic cable relating to the depopulation of the Chagos Archipelago

   1966 August 24, D[enis] A[rthur] Greenhill, British Indian Ocean Territory [handwritten note on a confidential diplomatic cable relating to the depopulation of the Chagos Archipelago]