Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A person afflicted with cretinism.
- n. Slang An idiot.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. One of a numerous class of deformed idiots found in certain valleys of the Alps and elsewhere; one afflicted with cretinism.
Wiktionary
- n. A person who fails to develop mentally and physically due to a congenital hypothyroidism.
- n. An idiot.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. One afflicted with cretinism.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a person of subnormal intelligence
Etymologies
- French crétin, from French dialectal, deformed and mentally retarded person found in certain Alpine valleys, from Vulgar Latin *christiānus, Christian, human being, poor fellow, from Latin Chrīstiānus, Christian; see Christian.
Examples
“The term cretin describes a person so affected, but, like such words as spastic, idiot, and lunatic, also is a word of abuse.”
“No. What makes Thomas a cretin is that he abdicates his JOB to decide whether punishments are cruel and unusual.”
“Dilan Esper: What makes Thomas a cretin is that he abdicates his JOB to decide whether punishments are cruel and unusual.”
“Surely this cretin is not Fucking With the Assistant!”
“Oh I am so glad you went off on a tangent and mentioned Eddie Murphy's annoying roles - reading about the irritating male friend that you called a cretin, kindly allow me to put Eddieee in that category.”
“I just learned the history of the word cretin today.”
“The word cretin is derived from the Latin creatura.”
“I've heard him called a cretin, "a retard", an idiot.”
“My reproductive rights are so important to me that I’m looking into moving to Canada if this (insert expletive here) low life cretin is actually elected to the Supreme Court.”
“Anyway, Friday evening I heard two of them — — one male, one female — — trying to figure out what the word cretin means.”
"Pay my respects to grace and virtue. Send my condolences to good."
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘cretin’.
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Words build meanings from origins( etymology )
These come from gamma meditation ,I think.
discursive, exogenous, machinations, purportedly, sumptuous, congruity, cantankerous, incongruous, festoon, hessian, ratiocinative, stratigraphic and 837 more...
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unkind words
unkind words or those refering them.
twit, gibe, blockhead, bonehead, cretin, dullard, imbecile, simpleton, clod, dunce, simp, ignoramus and 39 more...
sofrohna cretin...looking up words for a great book called Freak the Mighty...this word comes up ALOT in this book. :1 Feb 17, 2010
john “Indeed, the problem used to be widespread in the Alps. The word ‘cretin’ is believed to come from a mountain dialect of French, apparently because iodine deficiency in the Alps produced so many cretins. The problem ended when food was brought in from elsewhere and salt was iodized.�?
The New York Times, Raising the World’s I.Q. , by Nicholas D. Kristof, December 4, 2008 Dec 4, 2008
arby NOUN: Slang. One deficient in judgment and good sense: ass, fool, idiot,imbecile, jackass, mooncalf, moron, nincompoop, ninny, nitwit, simple, simpleton, softhead, tomfool. Informal: dope, gander, goose. Slang: ding-dong, dip, goof, jerk, nerd, schmo, schmuck, turkey. Sep 15, 2007
arby 1779, from Fr. Alpine dialect crestin, "a dwarfed and deformed idiot," from V.L. christianus "a Christian," a generic term for "anyone," but often with a sense of "poor fellow."
Sep 15, 2007