mountebank
Plural: mountebanks
Noun
- a flamboyant deceiver; one who attracts customers with tricks or jokes
- One who sells dubious medicines.
- One who sells by deception; a con artist.
- Any boastful, false pretender.
- An acrobat.
Verb
- To act as a mountebank.
- To cheat by boasting and false pretenses.
Origin / Etymology
From archaic Italian montambanco (“quack who mounts a bench to hawk his wares”), contracted from monta-in-banco (“mount on bench”).
Synonyms
charlatan, bristler, bunco artist, bunco-steerer, chiseler, con artist, confidence artist, confidence trickster, conman, fake, flimflammer, grifter, lugger, magsman, mountebank, quack, saltimbanco, shark-gull, sharker, sharpster, slicker, smooth operator, spiv
Scrabble Score: 18
mountebank: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordmountebank: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
mountebank: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary