pedant

• POS: Noun
• HYPHEN: ped=ant

CIDE DICTIONARY

pedant, n. [F. pédant, It. pedante, fr. Gr. paidey`ein to instruct, from pai^s boy. See Pedagogue.].

•  A schoolmaster; a pedagogue.  Dryden.  [1913 Webster]

  "A pedant that keeps a school i'th' church."  [1913 Webster]
•  One who puts on an air of learning; one who makes a vain display of learning; a pretender to superior knowledge.  Addison.  [1913 Webster]

  "A scholar, yet surely no pedant, was he."  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

pedant, n.
1 a person who insists on strict adherence to formal rules or literal meaning at the expense of a wider view.
2 a person who rates academic learning or technical knowledge above everything.
3 a person who is obsessed by a theory; a doctrinaire.

Derivative

pedantic adj. pedantically adv. pedantize v.intr. & tr. (also -ise). pedantry n. (pl. -ies).

Etymology

F p{eacute}dant f. It. pedante: app. formed as PEDAGOGUE

THESAURUS

pedant

Babbitt, Gongorist, Marinist, Middle American, Philistine, anal character, bluestocking, bourgeois, burgher, compulsive character, conformer, conformist, conventionalist, euphuist, fine writer, formalist, methodologist, middle-class type, model child, organization man, parrot, perfectionist, phrasemaker, phraseman, phrasemonger, plastic person, precieuse, precieux, precisian, precisianist, precisionist, purist, rhetorician, sheep, square, teenybopper, trimmer, wordspinner, yes-man

ROGET THESAURUS

pedant

Affectation

N affectation, affectedness, acting a part, pretense boasting, charlatanism, quackery, shallow profundity, pretension, airs, pedantry, purism, precisianism, euphuism, teratology, mannerism, simagree, grimace, conceit, foppery, dandyism, man millinery, coxcombry, puppyism, stiffness, formality, buckram, prudery, demureness, coquetry, mock modesty, minauderie, sentimentalism, mauvais honte, false shame, affector, performer, actor, pedant, pedagogue, doctrinaire, purist, euphuist, mannerist, grimacier, lump of affectation, precieuse ridicule, bas bleu, blue stocking, poetaster, prig, charlatan, petit maitre, flatterer, coquette, prude, puritan, affected, full of affectation, pretentious, pedantic, stilted, stagy, theatrical, big-sounding, ad captandum, canting, insincere, not natural, unnatural, self-conscious, maniere, artificial, overwrought, overdone, overacted, euphuist, stiff, starch, formal, prim, smug, demure, tire a quatre epingles, quakerish, puritanical, prudish, pragmatical, priggish, conceited, coxcomical, foppish, dandified, finical, finikin, mincing, simpering, namby-pamby, sentimental, conceit in weakest bodies strongest works.

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.

Ignoramus

N ignoramus, dunce, wooden spoon, no scholar, (imbecility) 499 (folly) 501 moron, imbecile, idiot, fool, jerk, nincompoop, asshole, dilettante, sciolist, smatterer, dabbler, half scholar, charlatan, wiseacre, greenhorn, amateur, novice, tyro, numskull, lubber, fool, pedant, bookless, shallow, ignorant, a wit with dunces and a dunce with wits.