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Dunce

//dʌns// noun

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    An unintelligent person.

    "When a true genius appears in the world you may know him by this sign; that the dunces are all in confederacy against him."

  2. 2
    a stupid person; these words are used to express a low opinion of someone's intelligence wordnet

Etymology

1530, named after John Duns Scotus (c. 1266–1308). Scotus was ironically a well-known Scottish thinker; his followers, however, opposed the philosophers of the Renaissance, and thus "dunce" was first used to describe someone rejecting new knowledge in 1530; later, any person deemed stupid.

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