bumpkin

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“
And a bumpkin, a dolt and a clod;

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Definitions (7)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (3)

  1. noun An awkward, unsophisticated person; a yokel.
  2. Word History
    The term bumpkin may at one time have been directed at an entire people rather than that segment of the population living in a rural area. The first recorded appearance of the word in 1570 is glossed by the Latin word Batavus, "Dutchman,” making plausible the suggestion that bumpkin may come from either the Middle Dutch word bommekijn, "little barrel,” or the Flemish word boomken, "shrub.” The connection would be between a squat object and the short rotund figure of the Dutchman in the popular imagination. Any bumpkin would surely prefer this etymology to the suggestion that bumpkin is a derivative of bum, "the rear end.”
  3. noun A short spar projecting from the deck of a ship, used to extend a sail or secure a block or stay.

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Examples (50)

  • An old bumpkin, an invalid, and a crazy widow -- it was a bad bunch to trust his life to, thought Gabriel. —  F ;SF; - vol 103 issue 02 - August 2002
  • The sharpest and strongest of these deadly weapons is generally stopped or fastened to the fore-tack bumpkin, a spar some ten or twelve feet long, projecting from the bows of a ship on each side like the horns of a snail, to which the tack or lower corner of the foresail is drawn down when the ship is on a wind. —  The Lieutenant and Commander
  • Yet he was portrayed as a Southern bumpkin, and he battled other ugly prejudices. —  Latest News
  • Hamels, who owns the best changeup this side of, well, Jamie Moyer, is just one of a multitude of weapons that can be deployed by manager Charlie Manuel, who will never again be called a bumpkin after masterminding just the second title in 125 years by the Phillies. —  The Seattle Times
  • Jay is one of the many words for a country bumpkin, along with hick, hillbilly, hayseed, redneck, and others. —  OUPblog
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Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

gawk ·  clodhopper ·  simpleton ·  churl ·  lout ·  boor ·  scribbler ·  moron ·  oaf ·  clown ·  coachmen ·  cad
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. Perhaps from Flemish boomken, shrub, diminutive of boom, tree; see bheuə- in Indo-European roots or from Middle Dutch bommekijn, diminutive of bomme, barrel.
  2. Probably from Dutch boomken, diminutive of boom, tree; see boom2.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. Prob. a particular use of bumpkin = bumkin, a short boom. Cf. block and blockhead, a stupid fellow.
 

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/ˈbəmpkɪn/
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