| 释义 |
ignoramus|ɪgnɒˈreɪməs|
Pl. -uses |-əsɪz|, also † -us.
[L., = ‘we do not know’, (in legal use) ‘we take no notice of [it]’.]
†1. The endorsement formerly made by a Grand Jury upon a bill or indictment presented to them, when they considered the evidence for the prosecution insufficient to warrant the case going to a petty jury. Hence quasi-n. or ellipt., esp. in the phrases to find, return, bring in (an) ignoramus; more rarely in passive, to be found ignoramus, returned ignoramus. Also transf. an answer which admits ignorance of the point in question; fig. a state of ignorance.
(The words now used in the finding of the Grand Jury are ‘not a true bill’, or ‘not found’ or ‘no bill’.)
a1577Sir T. Smith Commw. Eng. ii. xxii, If they doe not find it true, they write on the back-side, Ignoramus, and so deliver it to the Justices. 1598Florio Ital. Dict. Ep. Ded. a iv a, I haue seene the best, yea naturall Italians..giue it ouer, or giue their verdict, with An ignoramus. 1607Cowell Interpr., Ignoramus, is a word properly used by the grand Enquest..and written upon the Bill..when as they mislike their evidence, as defective, or too weak to make good the presentment. 1626Bernard Isle of Man (1627) 102 On the backe of this Inditement..they [the grand jury] write either Ignoramus, or Billa vera. 1631Star Chamb. Cases (Camden) 2 At the precedent Assizes the Grand Jury found an ignoramus. 1658J. Jones Ovid's Ibis 88 As for Medusa's brother I return ignoramus. 1682Enq. Elect. Sheriffs 14 An Ignoramus brought in upon an Indictment against the Earl of Shaftsbury. a1734North Exam. i. ii. §119 (1740) 95 Bills preferred to Grand Juries for High Treason duly proved were returned Ignoramus which was the Form for rejecting the Bill. 1742Fielding J. Andrews ii. xi, If you can prove your innocence..you will be found ignoramus, and no harm will be done. 1769Blackstone Comm. IV. xxiii. (1809) 305 The grand jury..used formerly to endorse on the back of the bill, ‘ignoramus’, or, we know nothing of it. 1827Hallam Const. Hist. (1876) II. xii. 450 The grand jury of London, in their celebrated ignoramus on the indictment preferred against Shaftesbury.
fig.1613Beaum. & Fl. Honest Man's Fort. v. iii, Wouldst thou come To point of marriage with an ignoramus? 1661Glanill Van. Dogm. ix. 78 It hath changed its site..yet whether that were caused by its translation from us, or ours from it, sense leaves us in an Ignoramus.
b. attrib. as in ignoramus jury, ignoramus crew, ignoramus Whig (alluding to the Grand Jury which rejected the bill against the Earl of Shaftesbury, 1681).
c1680Roxb. Ball. (1883) IV. 562 With nose cock't up, and visage like a Fury, Or Foreman of an Ignoramus Jury. 1681Ibid. IV. 351 All her Pride was re-assumed By the Ignoramus Whigs. 1683Ibid. (1885) V. 325 With all your Ignoramus Crew, That Justice hate, and Treason brew. 1682Dryden Dk. Guise Prol. 43 Let ignoramus juries find no traitors, And ignoramus poets scribble satires. 1828Macaulay Ess., Hallam (1889) 87 Where were..the members of ignoramus juries?
2. An ignorant person.[In reference to the origin of this, cf. Ruggle's Ignoramus (acted 1615) ‘written to expose the ignorance and arrogance of the common lawyers’, in which ‘Ignoramus’ is the name of a lawyer. The word occurs also in the following title, evidently in legal connexion: ‘The Case and Arguments against Sir Ignoramus, of Cambridge, in his Readings at Staple's Inn’, by R. Callis, Serjeant at Law (1648). See also quot. 1634 below.] a1616Beaumont Vertue of Sack in Poems (1653) N j, Give blockheads beere, And silly Ignoramus, such as think There's powder-treason in all Spanish drink. 1634Grammar Warre D vij, All students of Ignorance, with these bussards of Barbary, Ignoramus and Dulman his Clearke, were..exiled for euer out of all Grammar; and all false Latine was euer after confiscated to their vse. 1641Vox Borealis in Harl. Misc. (Malh.) IV. 434 So many of their commanders are ignoramusses in the very vocables of art. 1675Cocker Morals 8 By verbal sounds, who makes his small parts famous, But proves himself the greater Ignoramus. 1683Kennett tr. Erasm. on Folly 48 Who is so silly as to be Ignoramus to a Proverb? 1790Cowper Lett. 10 May, So ignorant am I and by such ignoramuses surrounded. 1853C. Brontë Villette vi, I am quite an ignoramus, I know nothing—nothing in the world.
Hence † ignoˈramus'd ppl. a., freed from prosecution by the ignoramus of the Grand Jury.
a1734North Exam. Chronol., 1681. July 8th. College ignoramus'd in Middlesex. Oct. 19th. Rouse ignoramus'd. |