interloper
[in-ter-loh-per]
- a person who interferes or meddles in the affairs of others: He was an athiest who felt like an interloper in this religious gathering.
- a person who intrudes into a region, field, or trade without a proper license.
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Origin of interloper
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for interloper
Contemporary Examples
Eloy may have been an interloper in the catwalk world, but Galliano's idiosyncratic creative ethic is what lured him in.
Are you afraid of being thought of as an interloper—a young, left-wing woman from Britain writing about American business?
Then why demand of Ailes that his opera bouffe company treat you as anything other than an interloper?
Thus satisfied that I was not an interloper, he moved his vehicle and allowed me to pass.
Suddenly I realize, sitting here looking at her defend herself against an interloper like me, how wrong I have been about her.
Historical Examples
His eyes glowed steadily as he contemplated this interloper in his domain.
The Leopard WomanStewart Edward White
But I don't like the idea of having such an interloper here.
The Universal ReciterVarious
He looks on the other man as an interloper, and his priest encourages that view.
Ireland as It IsRobert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
No sound was heard, and no demonstrations from the interloper were made.
He whirled to meet the expected onslaught of the interloper.
The Great Dome on MercuryArthur Leo Zagat
interloper
- an intruder
- a person who introduces himself into professional or social circles where he does not belong
- a person who interferes in matters that are not his concern
- a person who trades unlawfully
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Word Origin
C17: from inter- + loper, from Middle Dutch loopen to leap
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 interloper
n.
1590s, enterloper, "unauthorized trader trespassing on privileges of chartered companies," probably a hybrid from inter- "between" + -loper (from landloper "vagabond, adventurer," also, according to Johnson, "a term of reproach used by seamen of those who pass their lives on shore"); perhaps a dialectal form of leap, or from Middle Dutch loper "runner, rover," from lopen "to run." General sense of "self-interested intruder" is from 1630s.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper