laureate

• POS: Adjective, Noun
• HYPHEN: lau=re=ate

CIDE DICTIONARY

laureate, a. [L. laureatus, fr. laurea laurel tree, fr. laureus of laurel, fr. laurus laurel: cf. F. lauréat. Cf. Laurel.].

 Crowned, or decked, with laurel.  Chaucer.  [1913 Webster]
"To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies."  [1913 Webster]
"Soft on her lap her laureate son reclines."  [1913 Webster]

Poet laureate. (b) One who received an honorable degree in grammar, including poetry and rhetoric, at the English universities; -- so called as being presented with a wreath of laurel. [Obs.] (b) Formerly, an officer of the king's household, whose business was to compose an ode annually for the king's birthday, and other suitable occasions; now, a poet officially distinguished by such honorary title, the office being a sinecure. It is said this title was first given in the time of Edward IV. [Eng.] (c) A poet who has been publicly recognized as the most pre-eminent poet of a country or region; as, the poet laureate of the United States.

laureate, n. 

•  One crowned with laurel; a poet laureate.  Cleveland.  [1913 Webster]
•  A person who has been presented with an award for some distinguished achievement; as, a Nobel laureate; the Pris de Rome laureate; the Music Director Laureate; the conductor laureate.  [PJC]

laureate, v. i. 

 To honor with a wreath of laurel, as formerly was done in bestowing a degree at the English universities.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

laureate, adj. & n.
--adj.
1 wreathed with laurel as a mark of honour.
2 consisting of laurel; laurel-like.
--n.
1 a person who is honoured for outstanding creative or intellectual achievement (Nobel laureate).
2 = Poet Laureate.

Derivative

laureateship n.

Etymology

L laureatus f. laurea laurel-wreath f. laurus laurel

DEVIL DICTIONARY

laureate

adj. Crowned with leaves of the laurel. In England the Poet Laureate is an officer of the sovereign's court, acting as dancing skeleton at every royal feast and singing-mute at every royal funeral. Of all incumbents of that high office, Robert Southey had the most notable knack at drugging the Samson of public joy and cutting his hair to the quick; and he had an artistic color-sense which enabled him so to blacken a public grief as to give it the aspect of a national crime.

THESAURUS

laureate

A per se, Meistersinger, Olympic medal winner, Parnassian, ace, arch-poet, award winner, ballad maker, balladmonger, bard, beat poet, boss, bucoliast, champ, champion, chief, commander, crowned with laurel, dean, distinguished, elegist, epic poet, fili, fugleman, genius, head, higher-up, honored, idyllist, imagist, jongleur, leader, librettist, major poet, maker, master, medalist, minnesinger, minor poet, minstrel, modernist, nonpareil, occasional poet, odist, paragon, pastoral poet, pastoralist, poet, poet laureate, poetress, principal, prizeman, prizetaker, prizewinner, prodigy, rhapsode, rhapsodist, ruler, satirist, scop, senior, skald, sonneteer, star, superior, superman, superstar, symbolist, the greatest, the most, top dog, troubadour, trouveur, trovatore, vers libriste, vers-librist, virtuoso, world champion, world-record holder

ROGET THESAURUS

laureate

Poetry

N poetry, poetics, poesy, Muse, Calliope, tuneful Nine, Parnassus, Helicon, Pierides, Pierian spring, versification, rhyming, making verses, prosody, orthometry, poem, epic, epic poem, epopee, epopoea, ode, epode, idyl, lyric, eclogue, pastoral, bucolic, dithyramb, anacreontic, sonnet, roundelay, rondeau, rondo, madrigal, canzonet, cento, monody, elegy, amoebaeum, ghazal, palinode, dramatic poetry, lyric poetry, opera, posy, anthology, disjecta membra poetae song, ballad, lay, love song, drinking song, war song, sea song, lullaby, music, nursery rhymes, doggerel, Hudibrastic verse, prose run mad, macaronics, macaronic verse, leonine verse, runes, canto, stanza, distich, verse, line, couplet, triplet, quatrain, strophe, antistrophe, verse, rhyme, assonance, crambo, meter, measure, foot, numbers, strain, rhythm, accentuation, dactyl, spondee, trochee, anapest, hexameter, pentameter, Alexandrine, anacrusis, antispast, blank verse, ictus, elegiacs, elegiac verse, elegaic meter, elegaic poetry, poet, poet laureate, laureate, bard, lyrist, scald, skald, troubadour, trouvere, minstrel, minnesinger, meistersinger, improvisatore, versifier, sonneteer, rhymer, rhymist, rhymester, ballad monger, runer, poetaster, genus irritabile vatum, poetic, poetical, lyric, lyrical, tuneful, epic, dithyrambic, metrical, a catalectin, elegiac, iambic, trochaic, anapestic, amoebaeic, Melibean, skaldic, Ionic, Sapphic, Alcaic, Pindaric, a poem round and perfect as a star, Dichtung und Wahrheit, furor poeticus, his virtues formed the magic of his song, I do but sing because I must, I learnt life from the poets, licentia vatum, mutum est pictura poema, O for a muse of fire!, sweet food of sweetly uttered knowledge, the true poem is the poet's mind, Volk der Dichter und Denker, wisdom married to immortal verse.

Nobility

N nobility, rank, condition, distinction, optimacy, blood, pur sang, birth, high descent, order, quality, gentility, blue blood of Castile, ancien regime, high life, haute monde, upper classes, upper ten thousand, the four hundred, elite, aristocracy, great folks, fashionable world, peer, peerage, house of lords, house of peers, lords, lords temporal and spiritual, noblesse, noble, nobleman, lord, lordling, grandee, magnifico, hidalgo, daimio, daimyo, samurai, shizoku, don, donship, aristocrat, swell, three- tailed bashaw, gentleman, squire, squireen, patrician, laureate, gentry, gentlefolk, squirarchy, better sort magnates, primates, optimates, pantisocracy, king, atheling, prince, duke, marquis, marquisate, earl, viscount, baron, thane, banneret, baronet, baronetcy, knight, knighthood, count, armiger, laird, signior, seignior, esquire, boyar, margrave, vavasour, emir, ameer, scherif, sharif, effendi, wali, sahib, chevalier, maharaja, nawab, palsgrave, pasha, rajah, waldgrave, princess, begum, duchess, marchioness, countess, lady, dame, memsahib, Do$a, maharani, rani, personage of distinction, man of distinction, personage of rank, man of rank, personage of mark, man of mark, notables, notabilities, celebrity, bigwig, magnate, great man, star, superstar, big bug, big gun, great gun, gilded rooster, magni nominis umbra, every inch a king, noble, exalted, of rank, princely, titled, patrician, aristocratic, high-, well-born, of gentle blood, genteel, comme il faut, gentlemanlike, courtly, highly respectable, in high quarters, Adel sitzt im Gemuthe nicht im Gebluete, adelig und edel sind zweierlei, noblesse oblige.