#1: CockalorumDefinition: a boastful and self-important person; a strutting little fellow
About the word:
If cockalorum suggests a crowing cock, that's because cockalorum probably comes from kockeloeren – an obsolete Dutch dialect verb meaning "to crow."
#2: LickspittleDefinition: a fawning subordinate; a suck-up
About the word:
Lick plus spittle says it all: someone who licks another person's spit is pretty low indeed. Incidentally, lickspittle keeps company with bootlicker ("someone who acts obsequiously").
#3: Smellfungus
Definition: an excessively faultfinding person
About the word:
The original Smelfunguswas a character in an 18th century novel. Smelfungus, a traveler, satirized the author of Travels through France and Italy, a hypercritical guidebook of that time.
#4: Snollygoster
Definition: an unprincipled but shrewd person
About the word:
The story of its origin remains unknown, but snollygoster was first used in the nasty politics of 19th century America. One definition of the word dates to 1895, when a newspaper editor explained "a snollygoster is a fellow who wants office, regardless of party, platform or principles...."
#5: Ninnyhammer
Definition: ninny; simpleton, fool
About the word:
The word ninny is probably a shortening and alteration of "an innocent" (with the "n" from "an" getting transferred to the noun) and "hammer" adds punch. Writers who have used the word include J.R.R. Tolkien in the Lord of the Rings trilogy: "You're nowt but a ninnyhammer, Sam Gamgee."
#6: Mumpsimus
Definition: a stubborn person who insists on making an error in spite of being shown that it is wrong
About the word:
Supposedly, this insult originated with an illiterate priest who said mumpsimusrather than sumpsimus("we have taken" in Latin) during mass. When he was corrected, the priest replied that he would not change his old mumpsimus for his critic's newsumpsimus.
#7: Milksop
Definition: an unmanly man; a mollycoddle (a pampered or effeminate boy or man)
About the word:
Milksop literally means "bread soaked in milk." Chaucer was among the earliest to use milksop to describe an unmanly man (presumably one whose fiber had softened). By the way, the modern cousin of milksop,milquetoast, comes from Caspar Milquetoast, a timid cartoon character from the 1920s.
#8: Hobbledehoy
Definition: an awkward, gawky young man
About the word:
Hobbledehoy rhymes withboy: that's an easy way to remember whom this 16th century term insults. Its origin is unknown, although theories about its ancestry include hobble and hob (a term for "a clownish lout").
#9: Pettifogger
Definition: shyster; a lawyer whose methods are underhanded or disreputable
About the word:
The petti part of this word comes from petty, meaning "insignificant" (from the French petit, "small"). As for fogger, it once meant "lawyer" in English. According to one theory, it may come from "Fugger," the name of a successful family of 15th- and 16th-century German merchants and financiers. Germanic variations of "fugger" were used for the wealthy and avaricious, as well as for hucksters.
#10: Mooncalf
Definition: a foolish or absentminded person
About the word:
The original mooncalf was a false pregnancy, a growth in the womb supposedly influenced by a bad moon.Mooncalf then grew a sense outside the womb: simpleton. It also morphed into a literary word for a deformed monster. For instance, in Shakespeare's The Tempest, Stephano entreats Caliban, "Mooncalf, speak once in your life, if thou beest a good mooncalf."