churl

• POS: Noun

CIDE DICTIONARY

churl, n. [AS. ceorl a freeman of the lowest rank, man, husband; akin to D. karel, kerel, G. kerl, Dan. & Sw. karl, Icel. karl, and to the E. proper name Charles (orig., man, male), and perh. to Skr. jāra lover. Cf. Carl, Charles's Wain.].

•  A rustic; a countryman or laborer.  Spenser.  [1913 Webster]

  "Your rank is all reversed; let men of cloth
  Bow to the stalwart churls in overalls."  [1913 Webster]
•  A rough, surly, ill-bred man; a boor.  [1913 Webster]

  "A churl's courtesy rarely comes, but either for gain or falsehood."  [1913 Webster]
•  A selfish miser; an illiberal person; a niggard.  [1913 Webster]

  "Like to some rich churl hoarding up his pelf."  [1913 Webster]

churl, a. 

 Churlish; rough; selfish.  Ford.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

churl, n.
1 an ill-bred person.
2 archaic a peasant; a person of low birth.
3 archaic a surly or mean person.

Etymology

OE ceorl f. a WG root, = man

THESAURUS

churl

Babbitt, Philistine, Silas Marner, arriviste, bondmaid, bondman, bondslave, bondsman, bondswoman, boor, bounder, bourgeois, cad, captive, chattel, chattel slave, clodhopper, clown, concubine, curmudgeon, debt slave, epicier, galley slave, groundling, guttersnipe, helot, homager, hooligan, ill-bred fellow, liege, liege man, liege subject, looby, lout, low fellow, miser, mucker, muckworm, niggard, nouveau riche, odalisque, parvenu, peasant, penny pincher, peon, pinchfist, pinchgut, ribald, rough, roughneck, rowdy, ruffian, save-all, scrooge, serf, servant, skinflint, slave, subject, theow, thrall, tightwad, upstart, vassal, villein, vulgarian, vulgarist, yokel

ROGET THESAURUS

churl

Parsimony

N parsimony, parcity, parsimoniousness, stinginess, stint, illiberality, tenacity, avarice, greed, miser, niggard, churl, screw, skinflint, crib, codger, muckworm, scrimp, lickpenny, hunks, curmudgeon, Harpagon, harpy, extortioner, Jew, usurer, Hessian, pinch fist, pinch penny, parsimonious, penurious, stingy, miserly, mean, shabby, peddling, scrubby, penny wise, near, niggardly, close, fast handed, close handed, strait handed, close fisted, hard fisted, tight fisted, tight, sparing, chary, grudging, griping, illiberal, ungenerous, churlish, hidebound, sordid, mercenary, venal, covetous, usurious, avaricious, greedy, extortionate, rapacious, with a sparing hand, desunt inopioe multa avaritiae omnia, hoards after hoards his rising raptures fill, the unsunn'd heaps of miser's treasures.

Commonalty

N commonality, commonalty, democracy, obscurity, low condition, low life, low society, low company, bourgeoisie, mass of the people, mass of society, Brown Jones and Robinson, lower classes, humbler classes, humbler orders, vulgar herd, common herd, rank and file, hoc genus omne, the many, the general, the crowd, the people, the populace, the multitude, the million, the masses, the mobility, the peasantry, king Mob, proletariat, fruges consumere nati, demos, hoi polloi, great unwashed, man in the street, mob, rabble, rabble rout, chaff, rout, horde, canaille, scum of the people, residuum of the people, dregs of the people, dregs of society, swinish multitude, foex populi, trash, profanum vulgus, ignobile vulgus, vermin, riffraff, ragtag and bobtail, small fry, commoner, one of the people, democrat, plebeian, republican, proletary, proletaire, roturier, Mr, Snooks, bourgeois, epicier, Philistine, cockney, grisette, demimonde, peasant, countryman, boor, carle, churl, villain, villein, terrae filius, son of the land, serf, kern, tyke, tike, chuff, ryot, fellah, longshoreman, swain, clown, hind, clod, clodhopper, hobnail, yokel, bog-trotter, bumpkin, plowman, plowboy, rustic, hayseed, lunkhead, chaw-bacon, tiller of the soil, hewers of wood and drawers of water, groundling, gaffer, loon, put, cub, Tony Lumpkin, looby, rube, lout, underling, gamin, rough, pot- wallopper, slubberdegullion, vulgar fellow, low fellow, cad, curmudgeon, upstart, parvenu, skipjack, nobody, nobody one knows, hesterni quirites, pessoribus orti, bourgeois gentilhomme, novus homo, snob, gent, mushroom, no one knows who, adventurer, man of straw, beggar, gaberlunzie, muckworm, mudlark, sans culotte, raff, tatterdemalion, caitiff, ragamuffin, Pariah, outcast of society, tramp, vagabond, bezonian, panhandler, sundowner, chiffonnier, Cinderella, cinderwench, scrub, jade, gossoon, Goth, Vandal, Hottentot, Zulu, savage, barbarian, Yahoo, unlicked cub, rough diamond, barbarousness, barbarism, boeotia, ignoble, common, mean, low, base, vile, sorry, scrubby, beggarly, below par, no great shakes, homely, homespun, vulgar, low-minded, snobbish, plebeian, proletarian, of low parentage, of low origin, of low extraction, of mean parentage, of mean origin, of mean extraction, lowborn, baseborn, earthborn, mushroom, dunghill, risen from the ranks, unknown to fame, obscure, untitled, rustic, uncivilized, loutish, boorish, clownish, churlish, brutish, raffish, rude, unlicked, barbarous, barbarian, barbaric, barbaresque, cockney, born within sound of Bow bells, underling, menial, subaltern, below the salt, dummodo sit dives barbarus ipse placet.