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rapscallion. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
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English
Etymology
From an alteration of rascallion, a fanciful elaboration of rascal (“someone who is naughty”).
Pronunciation
Noun
rapscallion (plural rapscallions)
- (dated) A rascal, scamp, rogue, or scoundrel.
1884 December 10, Mark Twain , chapter XXVIII, in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: (Tom Sawyer’s Comrade) , London: Chatto & Windus, , →OCLC:“If I get away I sha’n’t be here,” I says, “to prove these rapscallions ain’t your uncles, and I couldn’t do it if I was here. I could swear they was beats and bummers, that’s all, though that’s worth something.
1982, Kurt Vonnegut, chapter 1, in Deadeye Dick:She had a studio built for him on a loft of the carriage house behind the family mansion when he was only ten years old, and she hired a rapscallion German cabinetmaker, who had studied art in Berlin in his youth, to give Father drawing and painting lessons on weekends and after school.
2025 June 19, Scott Heller, quoting Stephen Fry, “Stephen Fry Knows He’s Become a Middle-Aged Cliché”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:But I’m the kind of rapscallion who often prefers the very good to the GREAT.
Synonyms
Translations
Adjective
rapscallion (comparative more rapscallion, superlative most rapscallion)
- Disreputable, roguish.
1895, Charlotte M. Yonge, chapter 23, in The Carbonels:"I baint a-going to give my master's property to a lot of rapscallion thieves and robbers like you."
Translations