A rare or archaic term for one who speaks against; a person who contradicts or argues against something.
A compound of 'gain-' (meaning 'against' from Old Norse) and 'speaker,' literally creating 'one who speaks against.' This appears to be an extremely rare or dialectal formation from Middle English.
Gainspeaker is essentially a more literal version of 'gainsayer'—it's constructed exactly like 'speaker' or 'troublemaker,' combining a prefix with a profession noun! It shows how English created different words for the same concept in different time periods.
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