plebeian

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“
Yet though the plebeian was a citizen, and as such acquired 'commercium,' or the right to hold and devise property, it was only after a prolonged struggle that he achieved political equality with the patres.

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Definitions (13)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (6)

  1. adjective Of or relating to the common people of ancient Rome: a plebeian magistrate.
  2. adjective Of, belonging to, or characteristic of commoners.
  3. adjective Unrefined or coarse in nature or manner; common or vulgar: plebeian tastes.
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Examples (50)

  • I was so shabby and plebeian, then, that people actually dare offer me money! —  Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet
  • It is through her communes that she has acquired all she has ever had of liberty: through her workmen in wool or silk, through her merchants of Genoa Florence, Venice, and Pisa, that she has acquired her wealth through her artists, plebeian and republican, from Giotto to Michael Angelo, that she has acquired her renown; through her navigators,--plebeian,--that she has given a world to humanity through her Popes--sons of the people even they--that until the twelfth century she aided in the emancipation of the weak, and sent forth a word of unity to humanity. —  The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851
  • Perhaps the most interesting thing about him is that Count L. N. Tolstóy took a lively interest in this gifted plebeian, and offered to bear the cost of publishing his poems, regarding him as a new Koltzóff. —  A Survey of Russian Literature, with Selections
  • The touch of the plebeian was impure. —  The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India—Volume I (of IV)
  • She has abandoned house and husband to run away with a plebeian, the banto[u] at the green-grocer's on Shinjuku road. —  The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2)
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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

patrician ·  ignoble ·  vulgar ·  aristocratic ·  illustrious ·  irish ·  corrupt ·  middle-class ·  vile ·  rustic ·  provincial ·  senatorial
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 (2)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. From Latin plēbius, from plēbs, plēb-, the common people; see pelə-1 in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. from OF.plebeien, French plébéien, extended with suffix -en, English -an (cf. Spanish plebeyo = Pg .plebeo = Italian plebeo, plebejo, plebeian), from Latin plebeius, of or belonging to the common people, from plebs, plebes, the common people: see plebs.
 

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/pləˈbiən/
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