dunce
/dʌns/ noun
Forms dunces
- noun An unintelligent person.
Synonyms
idiot addle-brain addlehead addle pate airhead baboon beanbrain beetlebrain beetlehead berk bimbo birdbrain blockhead blubberbrain bonehead Boeotian boob bozo brainlet brickhead dunderhead numskull lunkhead hammerhead knucklehead loggerhead muttonhead shithead dumbass fuckhead
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.
Webster’s 1913
- noun One backward in book learning; a child or other person dull or weak in intellect; a dullard; a dolt.
Etymology [From Joannes Duns Scotus, a schoolman called the Subtle Doctor, who died in 1308. Originally in the phrase "a Duns man". See Note below.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “dunce”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details