illuminati

• POS: Noun Plural
• HYPHEN: il=lu=mi=na=ti

CIDE DICTIONARY

illuminati, n. pl. [L. illuminatus. See Illuminate, v. t., and cf. Illuminee.].

•  Literally, those who are enlightened  [1913 Webster]
•  Persons in the early church who had received baptism; in which ceremony a lighted taper was given them, as a symbol of the spiritual illumination they has received by that sacrament.  [1913 Webster]
•  Members of a sect which sprung up in Spain about the year 1575. Their principal doctrine was, that, by means of prayer, they had attained to so perfect a state as to have no need of ordinances, sacraments, good works, etc.; -- called also Alumbrados, Perfectibilists, etc.  [1913 Webster]
•  Members of certain associations in Modern Europe, who combined to promote social reforms, by which they expected to raise men and society to perfection, esp. of one originated in 1776 by Adam Weishaupt, professor of canon law at Ingolstadt, which spread rapidly for a time, but ceased after a few years.  [1913 Webster]
•  An obscure sect of French Familists;  [1913 Webster]
•  Any persons who profess special spiritual or intellectual enlightenment.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

illuminati, n.pl.
1 persons claiming to possess special knowledge or enlightenment.
2 (Illuminati) hist. any of various intellectual movements or societies of illuminati.

Derivative

illuminism n. illuminist n.

Etymology

pl. of L illuminatus or It. illuminato past part. (as ILLUMINATE)

DEVIL DICTIONARY

illuminati

n. A sect of Spanish heretics of the latter part of the sixteenth century; so called because they were light weights -- _cunctationes illuminati_.

ROGET THESAURUS

illuminati

Scholar

N scholar, connoisseur, savant, pundit, schoolman, professor, graduate, wrangler, academician, academist, master of arts, doctor, licentitate, gownsman, philosopher, master of math, scientist, clerk, sophist, sophister, linguist, glossolinguist, philologist, philologer, lexicographer, glossographer, grammarian, litterateur, literati, dilettanti, illuminati, cogniscenti, fellow, Hebraist, lexicologist, mullah, munshi, Sanskritish, sinologist, sinologue, Mezzofanti, admirable Crichton, Mecaenas, bookworm, helluo librorum, bibliophile, bibliomaniac, bluestocking, bas-bleu, bigwig, learned Theban, don, Artium Baccalaureus, Artium Magister, learned man, literary man, homo multarum literarum, man of learning, man of letters, man of education, man of genius, antiquarian, antiquary, archaeologist, sage, pedant, doctrinaire, pedagogue, Dr, Pangloss, pantologist, criminologist, schoolboy, learned, brought up at the feet of Gamaliel, he was a scholar and a ripe and good one, the manifold linguist.