Trimalchio

English

Proper noun

Trimalchio

1. (fiction) A wealthy freedman in the 1st century CE Roman work of fiction Satyricon.

Noun

Trimalchio (plural Trimalchios)

1. (rare) A nouveau riche.
   • 1925, F. Scott Fitzgerald, chapter 7, in The Great Gatsby:

     It was when curiosity about Gatsby was at its highest that the lights in his house failed to go on one Saturday night—and, as obscurely as it had begun, his career as Trimalchio was over.

   • 2001, Stuart James Fleming, Vinum: The Story of Roman Wine, Art Flair, →ISBN, page 33:

     Pliny and his circle would have favored the former, but the Trimalchios of his time without question would have accepted the volatility and riskiness of the latter in the hope of dazzling short-term profits.

   • 2015, Allyson Booth, Reading The Waste Land from the Bottom Up‎^[1], Springer, →ISBN:

     Eliot's epigraph is spoken by a Trimalchio, a dinner party host who is fond of pranks, careless of accuracy, and generally undependable.

Further reading

• Trimalchio on Wikipedia.Wikipedia