pre-Adamite

American  

[pree-ad-uh-mahyt] / priˈæd əˌmaɪt /

noun

1. a person supposed to have existed before Adam.

2. a person who believes that there were people in existence before Adam.

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adjective

1. Also pre-Adamic existing before Adam.

2. of or relating to the pre-Adamites.

Etymology

Origin of pre-Adamite

First recorded in 1655–65; pre- + Adam + -ite ¹

Example Sentences

"It was only a beginning—leading up to a study of the pre-Adamite trees, which I hope to make, later," Miss Billy answered.

From Project Gutenberg

Pre-Adamite, prē-ad′a-mīt, n. one who lived before Adam.—adjs.

From Project Gutenberg

I ask you, sir, if you ever, in the course of the travels in which you have out-rivalled Stanley, Cameron, Livingstone, Harry de Windt, and, may I add, De Rougemont, ever came across an oasis, consisting of two score villas, built with scarcely baked bricks, reposing on an arid waste amid a number of tumbled-down cottages, and surmounted by a mighty workhouse-like hotel looking down on a pre-Adamite beershop?

From Project Gutenberg

The book was not published, had not an existence, until seven or eight months after that article—a reasonably indifferent one, by the way—was penned; and yet we are asked to take that sort of pre-Adamite notice as a verdict in its favour!

From Project Gutenberg

A spin across the bar, the climbing of a rocky road, a sweep of seaward-facing pike, with dips into ferny hollows and ascents to pine-crowned bluffs, make the trip worth recording, and if to the exhilaration of the ride you add a dismount now and then to gather wintergreen and pick roses, with a loiter through a church-yard where many Hamiltons, both pre-Adamite and ante-historic, are sleeping the sleep of the just, you have the whole meaning of an afternoon outing on Big Chebeague.

From Project Gutenberg