noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of boor
First recorded in 1545–55; from Dutch boer or Low German būr (cognate with German Bauer “farmer”), derivative of unattestest Germanic bū- “to dwell, build, cultivate”; see -er 1; cf. bond 2
Explanation
A boor is a crude, rude person. Boors lack sophistication and manners. Boors are worse than boring; they’re offensive and repulsive. To be a boor is to be an obnoxious, unsophisticated oaf. A boor would swear in church. A boor would talk too loudly on the train. A boor would get too drunk at a wedding reception. Boors lack manners and taste. When a boor is around, other people want to leave. If you have self-control and culture, you’ll never be accused of being a boor.
Vocabulary lists containing boor
Scrooge, Grinch, and Churl: Wonderful Words for Unpleasant People
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Society and Solitude
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The Legend of Auntie Po
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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.
See Examples For:
Is this not the conundrum of our time, and aren’t we fortunate to have this boor reminding us of this with each new episode?
From Salon ● Jan. 15, 2026
Most memorable is the exit of Pozzo and Lucky that finds Pozzo slowly pushing Lucky in his wheelchair—illustrating the idea that there remains a bedrock of humanity even in this supercilious boor.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 29, 2025
In an instant, his beach route comment did me a huge kindness and made me feel like an incurious boor.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 8, 2024
But Americans have long abided being the boor of their peer nations; it’s practically a point of pride.
From Slate ● Sep. 7, 2023
Nately’s father was discreet and cultured; this old man was a boor.
From "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller
The salt suggestion drew howls of outrage from tea-lovers in Britain, where popular stereotype sees Americans as coffee-swilling boors who make tea, if at all, in the microwave.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 24, 2024
The incident made it into Beaton’s book, where the men, brought to life by the artist’s unmistakable pen, appear as grinning, cartoonish boors.
From New York Times ● Sep. 12, 2022
No beach has sand silky enough to risk navigating gaggles of solipsists committed to behaving like boors because the sea washes away all consequences.
From Salon ● Aug. 8, 2021
Again and again, Diana and Barbara have to endure and deflect unwanted male attention; you may lose count of all the run-of-the-mill boors and slobbering predators they have to fend off, and you’re meant to.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 15, 2020
Hunting the Leopard.—Two boors in Southern Africa, in the year 1822, returning from hunting the hartebeest, fell in with a leopard in a mountain ravine, and immediately gave chase to him.
From Illustrative Anecdotes of the Animal Kingdom by Samuel G. (Samuel Griswold) Goodrich
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
