shaveling

American  

[sheyv-ling] / ˈʃeɪv lɪŋ /

noun

1. Older Use: Disparaging. a clergyman with a shaven or tonsured head.

2. a young fellow; youngster.

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shaveling British  

/ ˈʃeɪvlɪŋ /

noun

1. derogatory a priest or clergyman with a shaven head

2. a young fellow; youth

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Etymology

Origin of shaveling

First recorded in 1520–30; shave + -ling ¹

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

shaveling

"You are a man of sinew yourself, monk, and methinks that you would have made a better soldier than a shaveling."

From Both Sides the Border A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower by Ralph Peacock

Mulholland, in which the first element means tonsured servant, shaveling, and the second is the name of a saint.

From The Romance of Names by Ernest Weekley

A fig for you and your shaveling Cardinal!'

From Under the Red Robe by Stanley John Weyman

For I am no shaveling ignoramus, but a gentleman of birth; aye, and one who, though poor, is a near cousin of the marshal himself.

From The Black Douglas by Frank Richards

Sure am I, when she told her shaveling all His Magdalen's adventure, tears were shed, Forgiveness evangelically shown, 'Loose hair and lifted eye,'—as some one says.

From Browning's England A Study in English Influences in Browning by Helen Archibald Clarke