butter eater

Negative term for common people, peasants, farmers, working class people etc. The lower end of the social status. Higher classes of people used finer expensive olive and nut oils.

According to the Greeks and Romans, a butter eater was a person who churned the milk of goats and cows ro make butter for eating and cooking because they couldn' afford finer olive oil. To the Roman 'well-to-do', butter was medicinal only, for burns, and such.