Wiktionary

pedant

See also: pédant and Pedant

English

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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From Middle French pedant, pedante, from Italian pedante (“a teacher, schoolmaster, pedant”), associated with unrelated Italian pedagogo (“teacher, pedagogue”). Compare French pédant.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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pedant (plural pedants)

  1. A person who makes an excessive or tedious show of their knowledge, especially regarding rules of vocabulary and grammar.
  2. A person who is overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning.
  3. (archaic) A teacher or schoolmaster.

Derived terms

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Translations

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Adjective

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pedant (not comparable)

  1. Pedantic.

Verb

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pedant (third-person singular simple present pedants, present participle pedanting, simple past and past participle pedanted)

  1. (rare, humorous) To be or act as a pedant.
    • 1648 October 10, Abraham Woodhead, Bodl., MS Clarendon 31, folio 276, verso:
      […] as any occasion of going behond[sic – meaning beyond] the sea with sombody, or pedanting in some Gentlemans house, &c., for clergy-employment I will accept of none.
    • 1942 spring, George R. Hahn, “Gangway for Homer”, in Science Fiction Quarterly, number 6, Holyoke, Mass.: Columbia Publications, →OCLC, page 125, column 2:
      Tediously he pedanted, hedging around concerning the Perfect State, eventually coming out into the open with his own private Perfect State plan.
    • 2000, Mark Barrowcliffe, “How the lady gets sawn in half”, in Girlfriend 44, London: Headline Book Publishing, →ISBN, page 223:
      ‘Most people in this country aren’t Christian, the standard package should not be Christian,’ Gerrard pedanted.
    • 2005 February 25, Mark Dahl, chapter 18, in Covenant Betrayed: Revelations of the Sixties, the Best of Time; the Worst of Time, book 2 (Despair and Dessent), Bloomington, Ind.: AuthorHouse, →ISBN, page 149:
      Jim’s mother pestered him daily for a month to come home for a talk. At first he rejected the offer, knowing what to expect, dear old dad would dance around the room pedanting about some shit that didn’t make sense anyway.
    • 2017, Ira Nayman, “Carrie-Anne’s Crew”, in The Multiverse is a Nice Place to Visit, But I Wouldn’t Want to Live There (Transdimensional Authority; 5), Dartford, Kent: Elsewhen Press, →ISBN:
      “Okay,” she said to the investigators, “how can I help you?” / “You, uhh, wouldn’t happen to have seven bodies lying around, would you?” Bao Bai-Leung, feeling a little ridiculous, asked. “Maybe in…your closet?” / “As I under stand human Anna to my,”[sic] Blarcch Beletchian pedanted at them, “there is not enough room for bodies to lie in a small space like a closet. Unless they were midgets like this person, or their limbs were detachable, or the closet was a gateway to eleven-dimensional space, or –” / “Oh, great!” TOM put in. “We got a literalist, here!”
    • 2017 May 30, David Steele, “Why do pedants pedant?”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian‎[1], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2017-05-30:
      So, why do pedants pedant? We don’t really know, but some tangential studies infer it’s to do with a mixture of personality, status-signalling and group identification.
    • 2022, Alex Beeton, “‘A shame to bee out of a prison, or in a Felloship’: Cooperation and Education”, in ‘Not Infected with the Venime of the Times’: The Rump Parliament and Places of Learning, 1649-53‎[2], thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, Oxford, Oxfordshire: University of Oxford, page 212:
      When one Oxford fellow was ejected in 1648 he immediately wrote to his royalist patron seeking employment ‘going behond [sic] the sea with sombody, or pedanting in some Gentlemans house’.128 Whether he succeeded or not is not known, but others certainly ended up ‘pedanting’.

See also

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Further reading

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Anagrams

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Czech

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Etymology

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Borrowed from German Pedant, from French pédant, from Italian pedante.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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pedant m anim

  1. pedant (person who is overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning)

Declension

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Declension of pedant (hard masculine animate)
singular plural
nominative pedant pedanti
genitive pedanta pedantů
dative pedantovi, pedantu pedantům
accusative pedanta pedanty
vocative pedante pedanti
locative pedantovi, pedantu pedantech
instrumental pedantem pedanty

Further reading

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  • “pedant”, in Příruční slovník jazyka českého (in Czech), 1935–1957
  • “pedant”, in Slovník spisovného jazyka českého (in Czech), 1960–1971, 1989
  • “pedant”, in Internetová jazyková příručka (in Czech)
  • “pedant” in Akademický slovník současné češtiny, 2012–2024, slovnikcestiny.cz

Dutch

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Pronunciation

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Adjective

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pedant (comparative pedanter, superlative pedantst)

  1. pedantic

Declension

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Declension of pedant
uninflected pedant
inflected pedante
comparative pedanter
positive comparative superlative
predicative/adverbial pedant pedanter het pedantst
het pedantste
indefinite m./f. sing. pedante pedantere pedantste
n. sing. pedant pedanter pedantste
plural pedante pedantere pedantste
definite pedante pedantere pedantste
partitive pedants pedanters —

Latin

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Verb

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pedant

  1. third-person plural present active indicative of pedō

Middle French

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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Borrowed from Italian pedante.

Noun

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pedant m (plural pedants)

  1. teacher; tutor; educator
  2. pedant

Polish

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Etymology

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Borrowed from French pédant.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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pedant m pers (female equivalent pedantka, related adjective pedancki)

  1. clean freak, neat freak, out-and-outer, pedant, prig, stickler (person obsessed with tidiness or cleanliness)
    Synonyms: porządniś, skrupulant, skrupulat
    Antonym: bałaganiarz

Declension

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Declension of pedant
singular plural
nominative pedant pedanci/pedanty (deprecative)
genitive pedanta pedantów
dative pedantowi pedantom
accusative pedanta pedantów
instrumental pedantem pedantami
locative pedancie pedantach
vocative pedancie pedanci
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adjectives
adverbs
nouns

Further reading

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  • pedant in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
  • pedant in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Romanian

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Etymology

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Borrowed from French Pedant.

Adjective

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pedant m or n (feminine singular pedantă, masculine plural pedanți, feminine and neuter plural pedante)

  1. pedantic

Declension

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singular plural
masculine neuter feminine masculine neuter feminine
nominative-
accusative 		indefinite pedant pedantă pedanți pedante
definite pedantul pedanta pedanții pedantele
genitive-
dative 		indefinite pedant pedante pedanți pedante
definite pedantului pedantei pedanților pedantelor

Serbo-Croatian

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Etymology

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Borrowed from German Pedant, from French pédant, from Italian pedante, from Ancient Greek παιδεία (paideía).

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /pědant/; /pedânt/
  • Hyphenation: pe‧dant

Noun

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pèdant, pedȁnt m (Cyrillic spelling пѐдант, педа̏нт)

  1. pedant (person who is overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning)

Declension

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Declension of pedant
singular plural
nominative pèdant pedanti
genitive pedanta pèdanātā
dative pedantu pedantima
accusative pedanta pedante
vocative pedante pedanti
locative pedantu pedantima
instrumental pedantom pedantima

References

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  • “pedant”, in Hrvatski jezični portal [Croatian language portal] (in Serbo-Croatian), 2006–2024

Swedish

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Noun

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pedant c

  1. a pedant (someone pedantic)
    Synonym: petimeter

Declension

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Declension of pedant
nominative genitive
singular indefinite pedant pedants
definite pedanten pedantens
plural indefinite pedanter pedanters
definite pedanterna pedanternas

References

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