prig

prig
   Used of someone who is thought to be over-precise in speech and manners. It has had this meaning since the late seventeenth century. ‘You horrible prig, you’ is an intimacy in An Error of Judgement, by Pamela Hansford Johnson. R.F.Delderfield, in Theirs was the Kingdom, has: ‘“I’m not calling you a prig,” Avery said, “just a good old British Puritan, and there’s a difference. Prigs have secret doubts about themselves, but Puritans don’t not even when the world falls about them.”’

A dictionary of epithets and terms of address . . 2015.

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  • prig — prig·ger; prig·gery; prig·gish; prig·gish·ly; prig·gish·ness; prig; prig·gism; …   English syllables

  • prig — [prıg] n [Date: 1600 1700; Origin: Probably from prig showy man (17 19 centuries), perhaps from prig tinker, thief (16 19 centuries)] someone who behaves in a morally good way and shows that they disapprove of the way other people behave used to… …   Dictionary of contemporary English

  • prig — [ prıg ] noun count someone who thinks they are better than other people because they always obey strict moral rules ╾ prig|gish adjective ╾ prig|gish|ness noun uncount …   Usage of the words and phrases in modern English

  • Prig — Prig, v. t. 1. To cheapen. [Scot.] [1913 Webster] 2. [Perhaps orig., to ride off with. See {Prick}, v. t.] To filch or steal; as, to prig a handkerchief. [Cant] [1913 Webster] …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • Prig — Prig, n. 1. A pert, conceited, pragmatical fellow. [1913 Webster] The queer prig of a doctor. Macaulay. [1913 Webster] 2. A thief; a filcher. [Cant] Shak. [1913 Webster] …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • prig — prig1 [prig] n. [< 16th c. cant < ?] 1. a person who is annoyingly smug in his or her moral behavior, attitudes, etc. 2. a person who is annoyingly fastidious about rules, small details, etc. priggery n. priggism priggish adj. priggishly… …   English World dictionary

  • Prig — Prig, v. i. [imp. & p. p. {Prigged}; p. pr. & vb. n. {Prigging}.] [A modification of prick.] To haggle about the price of a commodity; to bargain hard. [Prov. Eng. & Scot.] [1913 Webster] …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • prig — index steal Burton s Legal Thesaurus. William C. Burton. 2006 …   Law dictionary

  • prig — 1753, precisian in speech or manners, of unknown origin; earlier dandy, fop (1670s), thief (c.1600, in form prigger recorded from 1560s), also a thieves cant word for a tinker (1560s), though connection of this with the other meaning is uncertain …   Etymology dictionary

  • prig — ► NOUN ▪ a self righteously moralistic person. DERIVATIVES priggish adjective. ORIGIN originally in the sense «tinker, petty thief», later «disliked person»: of unknown origin …   English terms dictionary

  • Prig — A prig (IPAEng|ˈprɪg, sometimes spelled prigg) is someone who shows an inordinately zealous approach to matters of form and propriety; especially where the prig has the ability to show his/her superior knowledge to those who don t know the… …   Wikipedia

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