phrenologist
1
9.9
- noun
- /ˌfrɛnəˈlɒdʒɪst/
- Archaic
- If she had lived in the nineteenth century, she'd have been a phrenologist's delight.
- Phrenologists believed
- Phrenologists also
Examples
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No, a phrenologist feels and interprets the bumps on your head, skull features.
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"The cabman is a phrenologist so far: he looks in your face to see if his shilling is sure."
Blog text (6) -
What exactly does a phrenologist do?
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Although not a phrenologist, he did incorporate elements of phrenology in his thinking.
Academic text (1996) -
According to phrenologists, the larger each one of these parts of a person's brain was, the more likely they were to behave in a certain way.
Blog text (10) -
I have here a document signed by Windhill Castor, the renowned doctor and phrenologist of Krakow, stating that I am without doubt, the smallest living human on the continent of Europe, and in all the Russias.
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Phrenologists led the way by proclaiming not only that the brain was the organ of the mind, but that the brain was divisible into thirty-seven (the number varied among phrenologists) parts or faculties.
Academic text (1996) -
A phrenologist examined the shape of my skull to suggest my personality traits.
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As a practicing phrenologist, she believed that the bumps on a person's head could reveal their intellectual capabilities.
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Many people visited the phrenologist to learn about their character based on the contours of their skull.
Synonyms
1
9.9
A person who judges someone's character from their face
1
9.9
A person who says they can tell character or intelligence from skull shape
How Scientific
∞
2.1
635
2.7
- Archaic
1
9.9
- Offensive
1
8.6
- Offensive
34
8.6
Surface Forms
Morphology
phrenologist = phrenology (transparent) = phrenology + ist
Formed regularly from the noun 'phrenology' with the agentive suffix '-ist', so it straightforwardly denotes a person practicing phrenology.
Etymology
Phrenologist comes from the Greek root phren- meaning 'mind' and the ending -logist meaning 'one who studies'. A helpful image is to think of a phrenologist as someone who tried to 'read' the mind by feeling bumps on the skull, which is why the word means a person who claims to tell character and mental ability from head shape.