know-all

American

[noh-awl] / ˈnoʊˌɔl /

noun

Informal.

a know-it-all.

know-all British

noun

informal a person who pretends or appears to know a great deal

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of know-all

First recorded in 1880–85

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

There are no public ceremonies; a maxim of the fellowship is in substance: "Know all things but remain unknown."

From Time Magazine Archive

The clever men at Oxford Know all that there is to be knowed.

From The Wind in the Willows by Bransom, Paul

Resume your ancient care; and, if the god Your sire, and you, resolve on foreign blood, Know all are foreign, in a larger sense, Not born your subjects, or deriv'd from hence.

From The Aeneid English by Virgil

Know all the world, no greedy heir shall find, Die when I will, one couplet left behind.

From Poetical Works by Churchill, Charles

Know all wisdom through the universal Mind, and whoever draws his knowledge by inspiration from this source shall become as one with you, and we all shall be as one with the supreme Mind.

From The Right Knock A Story by Van-Anderson, Helen

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023