pedant

See also: pédant and Pedant

English

Alternative forms

• pædant (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle French pedant, pedante, from Italian pedante (“a teacher, schoolmaster, pedant”), associated with unrelated Italian pedagogo (“teacher, pedagogue”). Compare French pédant.

Pronunciation

• enPR: pĕdʹənt, IPA^(key): /ˈpɛdənt/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Noun

pedant (plural pedants)

1. A person who makes an excessive or tedious show of their knowledge, especially regarding rules of vocabulary and grammar.
2. A person who is overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning.
3. (archaic) A teacher or schoolmaster.
   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 24, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book I, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:

     I have in my youth oftentimes beene vexed to see a Pedant [tr. pedante] brought in, in most of Italian comedies, for a vice or sport-maker, and the nicke-name of Magister to be of no better signification amongst us.

Derived terms

• pedantic
• pedantly
• pedantry

Translations

person overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning

Arabic: مُتَحَذْلِق m (mutaḥaḏliq) Bulgarian: педант (bg) m (pedant) Catalan: pedant m or f Chinese: Mandarin: 夫子 (zh) (fūzǐ), 老學究 / 老学究 (zh) (lǎoxuéjiū), 學究 / 学究 (zh) (xuéjiū) Czech: pedant (cs) m Danish: pedant c Dutch: wijsneus (nl) m or f, weetal (nl) m or f Esperanto: pedanto (eo) Estonian: pedant (et), juuksekarvalõhestaja, tähenärija Finnish: saivartelija (fi), viisastelija (fi), pedantti (fi) French: pédant (fr) m, pédante (fr) f German: Pedant (de) m, Pedantin (de) f Greek: σχολαστικός (el) m (scholastikós) Icelandic: uppfullur af lærdómshroka m, uppfull af lærdómshroka f, smámunasamur maður m, smámunasöm kona f Ido: pedanto (io) Italian: pedante (it) m or f Japanese: 衒学者 (げんがくしゃ, gengakusha) Korean: 공론가 (gongnon'ga) Latvian: pedants Lithuanian: pedantas m Macedonian: педа́нт m (pedánt) Norwegian: Bokmål: pedant (no) m Nynorsk: pedant (nn) m Polish: pedant (pl) m, pedantka (pl) f Portuguese: pedante (pt) m or f Russian: педа́нт (ru) m (pedánt), педа́нтка (ru) f (pedántka) Spanish: pedante (es) m or f Swedish: pedant (sv) c

person who emphasizes their knowledge through strict adherence to rules of vocabulary and grammar

Arabic: مُتَشَدِّق m (mutašaddiq) Finnish: viisastelija (fi), saivartelija (fi) French: pédant (fr) m, pédante (fr) f Greek: δοκησίσοφος (el) (dokisísofos) Italian: cervellone (it) m, cervellona f Portuguese: pedante (pt) m or f

Adjective

pedant (not comparable)

1. Pedantic.

Verb

pedant (third-person singular simple present pedants, present participle pedanting, simple past and past participle pedanted)

1. (rare, humorous) To be or act as a pedant.
   • 1648 October 10, Abraham Woodhead, Bodl., MS Clarendon 31, folio 276, verso:

     […] as any occasion of going behond^{[sic – meaning beyond]} the sea with sombody, or pedanting in some Gentlemans house, &c., for clergy-employment I will accept of none.

   • 1942 spring, George R. Hahn, “Gangway for Homer”, in Science Fiction Quarterly, number 6, Holyoke, Mass.: Columbia Publications, →OCLC, page 125, column 2:

     Tediously he pedanted, hedging around concerning the Perfect State, eventually coming out into the open with his own private Perfect State plan.

   • 2000, Mark Barrowcliffe, “How the lady gets sawn in half”, in Girlfriend 44, London: Headline Book Publishing, →ISBN, page 223:

     ‘Most people in this country aren’t Christian, the standard package should not be Christian,’ Gerrard pedanted.

   • 2005 February 25, Mark Dahl, chapter 18, in Covenant Betrayed: Revelations of the Sixties, the Best of Time; the Worst of Time, book 2 (Despair and Dessent), Bloomington, Ind.: AuthorHouse, →ISBN, page 149:

     Jim’s mother pestered him daily for a month to come home for a talk. At first he rejected the offer, knowing what to expect, dear old dad would dance around the room pedanting about some shit that didn’t make sense anyway.

   • 2017, Ira Nayman, “Carrie-Anne’s Crew”, in The Multiverse is a Nice Place to Visit, But I Wouldn’t Want to Live There (Transdimensional Authority; 5), Dartford, Kent: Elsewhen Press, →ISBN:

     “Okay,” she said to the investigators, “how can I help you?” / “You, uhh, wouldn’t happen to have seven bodies lying around, would you?” Bao Bai-Leung, feeling a little ridiculous, asked. “Maybe in…your closet?” / “As I under stand human Anna to my,”^[sic] Blarcch Beletchian pedanted at them, “there is not enough room for bodies to lie in a small space like a closet. Unless they were midgets like this person, or their limbs were detachable, or the closet was a gateway to eleven-dimensional space, or –” / “Oh, great!” TOM put in. “We got a literalist, here!”

   • 2017 May 30, David Steele, “Why do pedants pedant?”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian‎, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2017-05-30:

     So, why do pedants pedant? We don’t really know, but some tangential studies infer it’s to do with a mixture of personality, status-signalling and group identification.

   • 2022, Alex Beeton, “‘A shame to bee out of a prison, or in a Felloship’: Cooperation and Education”, in ‘Not Infected with the Venime of the Times’: The Rump Parliament and Places of Learning, 1649-53‎, thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, Oxford, Oxfordshire: University of Oxford, page 212:

     When one Oxford fellow was ejected in 1648 he immediately wrote to his royalist patron seeking employment ‘going behond [sic] the sea with sombody, or pedanting in some Gentlemans house’.¹²⁸ Whether he succeeded or not is not known, but others certainly ended up ‘pedanting’.

See also

• Pedant in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)
• stickler

Further reading

• “pedant”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “pedant”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “pedant”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

Anagrams

• panted, pentad

Czech

Etymology

Borrowed from German Pedant, from French pédant, from Italian pedante.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ˈpɛdant]

Noun

pedant m anim

1. pedant (person who is overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning)

Declension

	singular	plural
nominative	pedant	pedanti
genitive	pedanta	pedantů
dative	pedantovi, pedantu	pedantům
accusative	pedanta	pedanty
vocative	pedante	pedanti
locative	pedantovi, pedantu	pedantech
instrumental	pedantem	pedanty

Declension of pedant (hard masculine animate)

Further reading

• “pedant”, in Příruční slovník jazyka českého (in Czech), 1935–1957
• “pedant”, in Slovník spisovného jazyka českého (in Czech), 1960–1971, 1989
• “pedant”, in Internetová jazyková příručka (in Czech), 2008–2025
• “pedant” in Akademický slovník současné češtiny, 2012–2025, slovnikcestiny.cz

Dutch

Pronunciation

• Audio:

  (file)

Adjective

pedant (comparative pedanter, superlative pedantst)

1. pedantic

Declension

Declension of pedant
uninflected	pedant
inflected	pedante
comparative	pedanter
		positive	comparative	superlative
predicative/adverbial		pedant	pedanter	het pedantst het pedantste
indefinite	m./f. sing.	pedante	pedantere	pedantste
	n. sing.	pedant	pedanter	pedantste
	plural	pedante	pedantere	pedantste
definite		pedante	pedantere	pedantste
partitive		pedants	pedanters	—

Latin

Verb

pedant

1. third-person plural present active indicative of pedō

Middle French

Alternative forms

• pedante

Etymology

Borrowed from Italian pedante.

Noun

pedant m (plural pedants)

1. teacher; tutor; educator
2. pedant

Polish

Etymology

Borrowed from French pédant.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈpɛ.dant/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛdant
• Syllabification: pe‧dant

Noun

pedant m pers (female equivalent pedantka, related adjective pedancki)

1. clean freak, neat freak, out-and-outer, pedant, prig, stickler (person obsessed with tidiness or cleanliness)

   Synonyms: porządniś, skrupulant, skrupulat

   Antonym: bałaganiarz

Declension

	singular	plural
nominative	pedant	pedanci/pedanty (deprecative)
genitive	pedanta	pedantów
dative	pedantowi	pedantom
accusative	pedanta	pedantów
instrumental	pedantem	pedantami
locative	pedancie	pedantach
vocative	pedancie	pedanci

Declension of pedant

Related terms

adjectives

• pedanteryjny
• pedantyczny

adverbs

• pedancko
• pedanteryjnie
• pedantycznie

nouns

• pedanteria
• pedanteryjność
• pedantyczność
• pedantyzm

Further reading

• pedant in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• pedant in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Romanian

Etymology

Borrowed from French Pedant.

Adjective

pedant m or n (feminine singular pedantă, masculine plural pedanți, feminine and neuter plural pedante)

1. pedantic

Declension

Declension of pedant

		singular				plural
		masculine	neuter	feminine		masculine	neuter	feminine
nominative- accusative	indefinite	pedant		pedantă		pedanți	pedante
	definite	pedantul		pedanta		pedanții	pedantele
genitive- dative	indefinite	pedant		pedante		pedanți	pedante
	definite	pedantului		pedantei		pedanților	pedantelor

Serbo-Croatian

Etymology

Borrowed from German Pedant, from French pédant, from Italian pedante, from Ancient Greek παιδεία (paideía).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pědant/; /pedânt/
• Hyphenation: pe‧dant

Noun

pèdant, pedȁnt m (Cyrillic spelling пѐдант, педа̏нт)

1. pedant (person who is overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning)

Declension

	singular	plural
nominative	pèdant	pedanti
genitive	pedanta	pèdanātā
dative	pedantu	pedantima
accusative	pedanta	pedante
vocative	pedante	pedanti
locative	pedantu	pedantima
instrumental	pedantom	pedantima

Declension of pedant

References

• “pedant”, in Hrvatski jezični portal [Croatian language portal] (in Serbo-Croatian), 2006–2025

Swedish

Noun

pedant c

1. a pedant (someone pedantic)

   Synonym: petimeter

Declension

Declension of pedant

		nominative	genitive
singular	indefinite	pedant	pedants
	definite	pedanten	pedantens
plural	indefinite	pedanter	pedanters
	definite	pedanterna	pedanternas

References

• pedant in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• pedant in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• pedant in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)