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Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A person who eats or consumes immoderate amounts of food and drink.
  2. n. A person with an inordinate capacity to receive or withstand something: a glutton for punishment.
  3. n. See wolverine.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. One who indulges to excess in eating, or in eating and drinking; one who gorges himself with food; a gormandizer.
  2. n. One who indulges in anything to excess; a greedy person.
  3. n. In zoöl.: A popular name of the wolverene, Gulo luscus or arcticus, the largest and most voracious species of the family Mustelidæ. It belongs to the same subfamily, Mustelinæ, as the martens and sables, but is a much larger animal, exceeding a badger in size, thick-set and clumsy, and somewhat resembling a small bear. It is of circumpolar distribution, inhabiting northerly parts of Europe, Asia, and America. The name has been more particnlarly used for the animal of Europe and Asia, from which the American species has sometimes been supposed to differ, and is usually called the wolverene. They are, however, specifically identical. See wolverene.
  4. Of or belonging to a glutton; gluttonous.
  5. To eat or indulge the appetite to excess; gormandize.
  6. To overfill, as with food; glut.
  7. n. In pugilism, one who takes a great deal of punishment before he is beaten.

Wiktionary

  1. adj. gluttonous; greedy; gormandizing.
  2. n. One who eats voraciously, or to excess; a gormandizer.
  3. n. One who gluts himself.
  4. n. A carnivorous mammal (Gulo gulo), of the family Mustelidæ, about the size of a large badger. It was formerly believed to be inordinately voracious, whence the name; the wolverine. It is a native of the northern parts of America, Europe, and Asia.
  5. v. To glut; to eat voraciously.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. One who eats voraciously, or to excess; a gormandizer.
  2. n. Fig.: One who gluts himself.
  3. n. A carnivorous mammal (Gulo gulo formerly Gulo luscus), of the weasel family Mustelidæ, about the size of a large badger; called also wolverine, wolverene and carcajou. It was formerly believed to be inordinately voracious, whence the name. It is a native of the northern parts of America, Europe, and Asia.
  4. adj. Gluttonous; greedy; gormandizing.
  5. v. To glut; to eat voraciously.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. a person who is devoted to eating and drinking to excess
  2. n. musteline mammal of northern Eurasia

Etymologies

  1. Middle English glotoun, from Old French gloton, from Latin gluttō, gluttōn-.

Examples

  • “Gourmand has taken on an even fancier ring than gourmet, while the word glutton can be applied only to someone who eats an enormous amount of food at one sitting — usually cheap food, and with the standard of what constitutes “enormous” revised upward each year for obvious reasons.”

    Hard to Swallow

  • “- If you are a habitual consumer of little cakes, it will jump out in front of you and call you, “fatty!” and you will be plagued every day of your life by being called a glutton and a pig.”

    Urban Legends

  • “In a society where food is scarce, the glutton is a wasteful menace.”

    Link Farm & Open Thread #26

  • “He was a carpenter after all, and I am told that carpenters in those days chopped their own trees and milled the wood by hand. and he was semitic. and he was called a glutton and a drunkard by his detractors, so maybe he had a belly and a red nose?”

    Philocrites: Christmas loot report.

  • “The writer of perhaps the greatest historical novel in the English language, "The Cloister and the Hearth," was what one might call a glutton for thoroughness.”

    Imperishable Fiction: An Inquiry into the Short Life of the 'Best Sellers' Reveals the Methods Which Brought into Being the Novels that Endure

  • “The writer of perhaps the greatest historical novel in the English language, _The Cloister and the Hearth_, was what one might call a glutton for thoroughness.”

    Vanishing Roads and Other Essays

  • “She is a little bit of a glutton is my Jane, and she overate herself at tea at the Singletons '.”

    A Modern Tomboy A Story for Girls

  • “The god of a glutton is his belly; of a lover his lust; and so every man serves that to which he is in bondage; and has his heart there where his treasure is.”

    Catena Aurea - Gospel of Matthew

  • “Jack O'Brien is already known as a glutton and he gets things started with a feast.”

    NPR Topics: News

  • “He ate and drank with them, and was called a glutton and a drunkard (Luke 7: 34).”

    Think Progress

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Lists

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‘glutton’ has been looked up 2118 times, added to 14 lists, commented on 1 time, and has a Scrabble score of 8.