pretender
[pri-ten-der]
- 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.
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Origin of pretender
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for pretender
Contemporary Examples
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
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
- a person who pretends or makes false allegations
- a person who mounts a claim, as to a throne or title
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for pretender
n.
1590s, "one who intends;" 1620s as "one who puts forth a claim;" agent noun from pretend (v.). Specifically of a claimant to the English throne from 1690s.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper