Definitions
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
- adj. Wandering from place to place or market to market.
- adj. Indirect, roundabout, or unnecessarily complex.
from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Going about, as from market-place to market-place; walking or wandering from house to house; vagrant; vagabond.
Etymologies
From Latin circum ("round about") (compare English circum-) with -foraneous, from forum ("market place"). (Wiktionary)
Examples
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Proverb: I mean those circumforaneous Wits whom every Nation calls by the Name of that Dish of Meat which it loves best.
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In the first Place I must observe, that there is a Set of merry Drolls, whom the common People of all Countries admire, and seem to love so well, _that they could eat them_, according to the old Proverb: I mean those circumforaneous Wits whom every Nation calls by the Name of that
The Spectator, Volume 1 Eighteenth-Century Periodical Essays
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Let the megalophonous grasshopper sound a blast and summon hither the perfunctory and circumforaneous Tumble-Bug, to the end that excavations may be made and learning gather new treasures. "
pavonine commented on the word circumforaneous
Going about or abroad; walking or wandering from house to
house.
November 25, 2007