pretender
[pri-ten-der]
noun
a person who pretends, especially for a dishonest purpose.
an aspirant or claimant (often followed by to): a pretender to the throne.
a person who makes unjustified or false claims, statements, etc., as about personal status, abilities, intentions, or the like: a pretender to literary genius.
Origin of pretender
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019
Related Words for pretender
quack, hypocrite, fraud, actor, deceiver, impostor, faker, imitator, fake, snob, charlatan, dissemblerExamples from the Web for pretender
Contemporary Examples of pretender
And cancer, deceiver, pretender, coward; it cannot even subsist without the vibrant people it depends on.
All was jolly and genial between the king of late night and the pretender to the throne.
Rush Limbaugh has called Dede Scozzafava a “pretender” and an “extreme liberal Republican” who “might as well be a Democrat.”
Historical Examples of pretender
He has an air, it is true, but his air is not a breeze, like the air of a pretender to fashion.
The moment might be propitious to the pretender, however false his claim.
The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second SeriesRafael Sabatini
And yet you see after all I am like to turn out only a pretender.
The Bramleighs Of Bishop's FollyCharles James Lever
A particular account of the "Pretender's Magazine" is extant.
Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745.Mrs. Thomson
The General asked him "if he had been along with the Pretender?"
Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745Mrs. Thomson
pretender
noun
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper