buffoon

[ buh-foon ]

/ bəˈfun /

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR buffoon ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

a person who amuses others by tricks, jokes, odd gestures and postures, etc.

a person given to coarse or undignified joking.

Nearby words

buffett, bufflehead, buffo, buffon, buffon, georges louis leclerc, comte de, buffoon, buffoonery, buffs, buffy, buffy coat, bufo

Origin of buffoon

1540–50; earlier buffon < French < Italian buffone, equivalent to buff- (expressive base; compare buffa puff of breath, buffare to puff, puff up one's checks) + -one agent suffix ≪ Latin -ō, accusative -ōnem

SYNONYMS FOR buffoon

1 jester, clown, fool.

2 boor.

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR buffoon ON THESAURUS.COM

Related formsbuf·foon·er·y

[buh-foo-nuh-ree] /bəˈfu nə ri/, nounbuf·foon·ish, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for buffoon

Apparently, he was known in the Foreign Office as "HBH"—His Buffoon Highness.
Good Riddance to Prince Andrew’s Day Job!|William Underhill|July 23, 2011|DAILY BEAST
Well, Coughlin was a buffoon, too, and in 1932, the party of Herbert Hoover was also in disarray.
Who Made Frank Rich God?|Lee Siegel|March 16, 2009|DAILY BEAST
Keep that source of remarkable strength all quiet on the buffoon front.
Good Riddance, O.J.|Stanley Crouch|December 6, 2008|DAILY BEAST
MANY people think that because the clown wears a grotesque garb and indulges in silly antics, that he is a buffoon all the time.
The Autobiography of a Clown|Isaac Frederick Marcosson

Ecclesiastical persons also were represented with it, since the buffoon always wore it, whatever his rôle.
Folkways|William Graham Sumner
Sombre is human life, and as yet without meaning: a buffoon may be fateful to it.
Thus Spake Zarathustra|Friedrich Nietzsche
Urbain did not share the general hilarity; however, he lent his ear to a new scene which the buffoon was playing.
The Barber of Paris|Charles Paul de Kock
He had been a buffoon, and his dress still bore many tokens of his former profession.
A Word Only A Word, Complete|Georg Ebers

British Dictionary definitions for buffoon

buffoon

/ (bəˈfuːn) /

noun

a person who amuses others by ridiculous or odd behaviour, jokes, etc

a foolish person

Derived Formsbuffoonery, noun

Word Origin for buffoon

C16: from French bouffon, from Italian buffone, from Medieval Latin būfō, from Latin: toad

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

Word Origin and History for buffoon

buffoon

1540s, "type of pantomime dance;" 1580s, "clown," from Middle French bouffon (16c.), from Italian buffone "jester," from buffa "joke, jest, pleasantry," from buffare "to puff out the cheeks," a comic gesture, of echoic origin. Also cf. -oon.