warming pan

warming pan (plural warming pans)

1. A covered metal pan attached to a long handle, holding live coals and used to warm a bed.
   • 1599, William Shakespeare, The Life of Henry the Fifth, II. i. 81:

     Good / Bardolph, put thy face between his sheets, and do the / office of a warming-pan. Faith, he's very ill.

2. (figuratively, dated) A person put into a situation to hold it until another person can take over.

• bedwarmer