mountebank

WOTD – 11 October 2006    

English

Etymology

From Italian montambanco (“quack who mounts a bench to hawk his wares”) contracted from Italian monta-in-banco (“mount on bench”).

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈmaʊntəˌbæŋk/

• Audio (US)

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Noun

mountebank (plural mountebanks)

1. One who sells dubious medicines.

   There is nothing so impossible in Nature but mountebanks will undertake; nothing so incredible but they will affirm. - John Bull

2. One who sells by deception; a con artist; a charlatan.
   • 1951, Isaac Asimov, Foundation (1974 Panther Books Ltd publication), part III: “The Mayors”, chapter 7, page 106, ¶ 13

     “Are you allowing yourselves to be fooled by this mountebank, this harlequin? Do you cringe before a religion compounded of clouds and moonbeams? This man is an imposter and the Galactic Spirit he speaks of a fraud of the imagination devised to——”

Quotations

* For usage examples of this term, see the citations page.

See also

• patent medicine
• snake oil
• quack

Verb

mountebank (third-person singular simple present mountebanks, present participle mountebanking, simple past and past participle mountebanked)

1. (intransitive) To act as a mountebank.
2. (transitive) To cheat by boasting and false pretenses.

   Chide me no more. I'll mountebank their loves,
   Cog their hearts from them, and come home beloved - Coriolanus, Wm. Shakespeare

Derived terms

• mountebankery