cynic
cynic definition
cynic (sin′ik)
noun
- a member of a school of ancient Greek philosophers who held virtue to be the only good and stressed independence from worldly needs and pleasures: they became critical of the rest of society and its material interests
- a cynical person
Etymology: L Cynicus < Gr kynikos, lit., doglike, as if < kyōn, dog (see hound), nickname of Diogenes, but prob. in allusion to the Kynosarges, a gymnasium where the Cynics taught (< kyōn + argos, lit., white dog, so named after an animal in a myth concerning Hercules, to whom the gymnasium was sacred)
adjective
- of or like the Cynics or their doctrines
- cynical
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