pickthank

[pik-thangk]

noun

Archaic.

1. a person who seeks favor by flattery or gossip; sycophant.

Word History and Origins

Origin of pickthank¹

First recorded in 1490–1500; noun use of verb phrase pick a thank, pick thanks

Example Sentences

He now turned his tremendous looks on the down-stricken serving-men, who, as it was apparent, had been groundlessly calumniating his angelic wife; he scornfully rated them, and swore a deep oath, that the first eaves-dropping pickthank who again accused his virtuous wife to him, he would cast into the dungeon, and there let him lie and rot.

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"It were very just to lay you beside him," he said, "but the blood of a base pickthank shall never mix on my father's dirk with that of a brave man."

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He could not tolerate the spirit of the pickthank; being what we are, he wished us to see others with a generous eye of admiration, not with the smallness of the seeker after faults.

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Three witnesses were then called: Envy, Superstition, and Pickthank.

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Pickthank deposes that he has heard Faithful rail on Beelzebub, and speak contemptuously of his honourable friends my Lord Old Man, my Lord Carnal Delight, my Lord Luxurious, my Lord Desire of Vain Glory, my Lord Lechery, Sir Having Greedy, and the rest of the nobility, besides which he has railed against his lordship on the bench himself, calling him an ungodly villain.

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