pedantess

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Jump to navigation Jump to search

English

[edit]

Etymology

[edit]

From pedant +‎ -ess.

Noun

[edit]

pedantess (plural pedantesses)

  1. (rare, obsolete) female equivalent of pedant
    • 1784, [Robert] Bage, “Barham Downs”, in The Novels of Swift, Bage, and Cumberland, London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., published 1824, page 257:
      Unfeeling pedantess, says I to myself; thou art no wife for me.
    • 1820 May, W. Kenny, chapter VII, in The Historical and Unrevealed Memoirs of the Political and Private Life of Napoleon Buonaparte; Serving as an Illustration of the Manuscript of St. Helena. From 1781 to 1798. [], 3rd edition, page 95:
      Why does not this pedantess wear the breeches?
    • 1884 July 1, H. Montagu Butler, “The Teacher an Example to His Pupils”, in The Journal of Education, a Monthly Record and Review, volume VI, number 180, London: William Rice, page 263:
      We do not wish our boys and girls to become pedants. Well, then, we must not become pedants and pedantesses ourselves.
    • 1895, R[ichard] Garnett, The Age of Dryden, London: George Bell and Sons, page 251:
      ‘Dryden weighs poets in his virtuoso’s scales that will weigh to the hundredth part of a grain, as curiously as Juvenal’s lady pedantess[]

Anagrams

[edit]