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peasant

Pronunciation: /ˈpɛzənt/

The English word “peasant” has 6 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. A member of the lowly social class that toils on the land, constituted by small farmers and tenants, sharecroppers, farmhands and other laborers on the land where they form the main labor force in agriculture and horticulture.
  2. A country person.
  3. An uncouth, crude or ill-bred person.
  4. A worker unit.

adjective

  1. Characteristic of or relating to a peasant or peasants; unsophisticated.
  2. Lowly, vulgar; reprehensible; dishonest.

Etymology

From Late Middle English paissaunt, from Anglo-Norman paisant, from Old French païsant, païsan (“countryman, peasant”), from païs (“country”), from Latin pāgus (“countryside”) + Old French -enc (“member of”), from Frankish -inc, -ing "-ing"; which was an alteration of earlier Late Latin pāgēnsis (“inhabitant of a district”). Doublet of paisano. Via Latin pāgus cognate with pagan (compare…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.