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The Idiot by Evert Larock (1892). An idiot, in modern use, is a stupid or foolish person. 'Idiot' was formerly a technical term in legal and psychiatric contexts for some kinds of profound intellectual disability where the mental age is two years or less, and the person cannot guard themself against common physical dangers.
Shmendrik (Yiddish: שמענדריק), also rendered as schmendrick or shmendrick is a Yiddish word meaning a stupid person or a little hapless jerk ("a pathetic sad sack" [1]). Its origin is the name of a clueless mama's boy played by Sigmund Mogulesko in an 1877 comedy Shmendrik, oder di komishe Chaseneh ( Schmendrik or The Comical Wedding ...
Schmuck, or shmuck, is a pejorative term meaning one who is stupid or foolish, or an obnoxious, contemptible or detestable person. The word came into the English language from Yiddish (Yiddish: שמאָק, shmok), where it has similar pejorative meanings, but where its literal meaning is a vulgar term for a penis. [1]
2. Stupid, clumsy person [45] boiled as an owl Alternate names for intoxicated; see § drunk [46] [b] boiler Automobile [20] boob Dumb guy [44] boob-tickler Girl who has to entertain her father's customers from out of town [8] bookkeeping The art of making a date [8] booklegger. Main article: Rum-running. Dealer in suppressed novels [8] bootleg ...
The English language, along with other European ones, adopted the word and used it as similar meaning, slow and delayed. In English, the word "to decelerate " would become a more common term than "to retard", while in others like French [ 9 ] or Catalan, [ 10 ] retard is still in common usage to mean 'delay' ( tard ).
The Historical Thesaurus of English (HTE) is a complete database of all the words in the Oxford English Dictionary and other dictionaries (including Old English), arranged by semantic field and date. In this way, the HTE arranges the whole vocabulary of English, from the earliest written records in Old English to the present, alongside dates of ...
Otherwise, the word κοάλεμος was used in the sense of "stupid person" or also "blockhead". [3] An ancient false etymology derives κοάλεμος from κοέω (koeō) "perceive" and ἡλεός (ēleos) "distraught, crazed". [4] This etymology is not established, however. [5]
Stupidity is a quality or state of being stupid, or an act or idea that exhibits properties of being stupid. [4] In a character study of "The Stupid Man" attributed to the Greek philosopher Theophrastus (c. 371 – c. 287 BC), stupidity was defined as "mental slowness in speech or action". The modern English word "stupid" has a broad range of ...