snob

snob
\ \ [18] Snob originally meant a ‘shoemaker’.
\ \ Cambridge University students of the late 18th century took it over as a slang term for a ‘townsman, someone not a member of the university’, and it seems to have been this usage which formed the basis in the 1830s for the emergence of the new general sense ‘member of the lower orders’ (‘The nobs have lost their dirty seats – the honest snobs have got ’em’, proclaimed the Lincoln Herald on 22 July 1831, anticipating the new Reform Act). This in turn developed into ‘ostentatiously vulgar person’, but it was the novelist William Thackeray who really sowed the seeds of the word’s modern meaning in his Book of Snobs 1848, where he used it for ‘someone vulgarly aping his social superiors’. It has since broadened out to include those who insist on their gentility as well as those who aspire to it. As for the origins of the word snob itself, they remain a mystery. An ingenious suggestion once put forward is that it came from s. nob., supposedly an abbreviation for Latin sine nobilitatewithout nobility’, but this ignores the word’s early history.

Word origins - 2ed. . 2005.

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  • snob — snob …   Dictionnaire des rimes

  • snob — [ snɔb ] n. et adj. • 1843 le Snob, sobriquet; mot angl. « cordonnier », qui désignait en arg. de l université de Cambridge « celui qui n était pas de l université » ♦ Personne qui admire et imite sans discernement les manières, les goûts, les… …   Encyclopédie Universelle

  • snob — SNOB, SNOÁBĂ, snobi, snoabe s.m. şi f., adj. (Persoană) care admiră şi adoptă fără discernământ şi cu orice preţ tot ce este la modă. – Din fr. snob. Trimis de RACAI, 07.12.2003. Sursa: DEX 98  SNOB adj. (rar) snobistic. (Gest snob.) Trimis de… …   Dicționar Român

  • snob — snob; snob·bery; snob·bish; snob·bism; snob·by; snob·dom; snob·ling; snob·bish·ly; snob·bish·ness; …   English syllables

  • snob — [snɔb US sna:b] n [Date: 1800 1900; Origin: snob shoemaker, person of low social rank (18 19 centuries)] 1.) someone who thinks they are better than people from a lower social class used to show disapproval ▪ Stop being such a snob. ▪ I don t… …   Dictionary of contemporary English

  • Snob — Snob, n. [Icel. sn[=a]pr a dolt, impostor, charlatan. Cf. {Snub}.] 1. A vulgar person who affects to be better, richer, or more fashionable, than he really is; a vulgar upstart; one who apes his superiors. Thackeray. [1913 Webster] Essentially… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • snob — snòb agg.inv., s.m. e f.inv. CO 1. agg.inv., s.m. e f.inv., che, chi ostenta raffinatezza, cercando di assumere atteggiamenti propri di classi sociali più elevate | che, chi manifesta superiorità e disprezzo nei confronti di ciò che giudica… …   Dizionario italiano

  • Snob — Sm arrogante, sich übertrieben exklusiv gebende Person erw. fremd. Erkennbar fremd (19. Jh.) Entlehnung. Entlehnt aus ne. snob, dessen Herkunft nicht sicher geklärt ist. Das Wort ist seit dem Ende des 18. Jhs. in nordenglischen Dialekten belegt… …   Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen sprache

  • snob|by — «SNOB ee», adjective, bi|er, bi|est. of or having to do with a snob; snobbish …   Useful english dictionary

  • snob — /snob/, n. 1. a person who imitates, cultivates, or slavishly admires social superiors and is condescending or overbearing to others. 2. a person who believes himself or herself an expert or connoisseur in a given field and is condescending… …   Universalium

  • Snob — 〈[snɔ̣b] m.; Gen.: s, Pl.: s; abwertend〉 vornehm tuender Mensch, der nach gesellschaftl. Ansehen strebt, das Extravagante, Exklusive liebt u. auf andere hinabblickt [Etym.: <engl. snob, Ursprung unsicher, vielleicht urspr. Kurzform von lat.… …   Lexikalische Deutsches Wörterbuch

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