jack-of-all-trades
Americannoun
plural
jacks-of-all-tradesnoun
Etymology
Origin of jack-of-all-trades
First recorded in 1610–20
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.
He could start by cutting the animated sequence in which Mary, her young charges and Bert, a local jack-of-all-trades, jump into one of Bert’s sidewalk chalk paintings.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 14, 2025
To make matters even more difficult, Hulls, a painter, adventurer and itinerant jack-of-all-trades, was not really a writer.
From New York Times • Mar. 1, 2024
Maurice Sr. was both jack-of-all-trades and working-class Renaissance man, for a time alternating roles as nightclub bouncer and drum-playing orchestra leader, Nurse said.
From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 2, 2024
Once everyone in the secondary is heathy, Bryant could end up being something of jack-of-all-trades reserve, ala Ryan Neal.
From Seattle Times • Sep. 2, 2023
Alf was a jack-of-all-trades, carpenter, tinsmith, blacksmith, electrician, plasterer, scissors grinder, and cobbler.
From "East of Eden" by John Steinbeck
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.
