mountebank

American  

[moun-tuh-bangk] / ˈmaʊn təˌbæŋk /

noun

1. a person who sells quack medicines, as from a platform in public places, attracting and influencing an audience by tricks, storytelling, etc.

   Synonyms:

   pitchman

2. any charlatan or quack.

   Synonyms:

   fraud, pretender, phony

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verb (used without object)

1. to act or operate as a mountebank.

mountebank British  

/ ˈmaʊntɪˌbæŋk /

noun

1. (formerly) a person who sold quack medicines in public places

2. a charlatan; fake

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verb

1. (intr) to play the mountebank

Other Word Forms

• mountebankery noun

Etymology

Origin of mountebank

1570–80; (< Middle French ) < Italian montimbanco one who climbs on a bench, equivalent to mont ( are ) to climb ( mount ¹ ) + -im-, variant of in on + banco bench ( bank ² )

Example Sentences

Mencken described Bryan as “a charlatan, a mountebank, a zany without sense or dignity.”

From Salon • Jan. 25, 2024

And Ricky goes to his library and then sends me an entire description of what the mountebank would be doing.”

From Slate • Dec. 10, 2018

“Fancy language, senator. I will duel you at dawn you charlatan, you mountebank, you mendacious flimflamming dissembler. Bring a pistol and a thesaurus,” he quipped.

From The Guardian • Apr. 5, 2017

“Some dreadful mountebank in a long-tailed coat will open . . . with a windy speech; then another mountebank will repeat the same rubbish in other words.”

From The New Yorker • Jun. 27, 2016

Was it not a dangerous word, too closely connected to Hobbes and to dubious stories about sympathetic magic told by Digby—someone whom John Evelyn, another early member, could dismiss as an arrant mountebank?

From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton