Daily AncestorLimner
A limner was a painter, in early America usually a traveling portrait painter with little formal training.
The word first meant someone who decorated manuscripts. In colonial America and the early 1800s, limners traveled from town to town painting portraits for merchants and farm families who wanted a likeness.
Many surviving early American portraits are by unnamed limners. If an ancestor was called a limner, look for unsigned family portraits in museums or historical societies of that region.
As seen in a recordEarly American records and newspaper notices
Ammi Bliss, limner, of Hartford
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Daily Ancestor. "Limner." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/occupations/limner. Last checked 2026-10-01.