Definition of "mountebank"

She is abus'd, ſtolne from me, and corrupted / By Spels, and Medicines, bought of Mountebanks

c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act I, scene iii], page 313

There is nothing ſo impoſſible in Nature, but Mountebanks vvill undertake; nothing ſo incredible but they vvill affirm: Mrs. Bull’s Condition vvas look’d upon as deſperate by all the Men of Art; then Signior Cavallo judged it vvas high time for him to interpoſe, he bragg’d that he had an infallible Ointment and Plaiſter, vvhich being applied to the Sore vvould Cure it in a fevv Days; […]

1712, Humphry Polesworth [pseudonym; John Arbuthnot], “How Signior Cavallo, an Italian Quack, Undertook to Cure Mrs. Bull of Her Ulcer”, in Law is a Bottomless-Pit. […], London: […] John Morphew, […], page 16

A personage appears before him with a broad-brimmed hat, such as the students wear at Wittenberg, a wandering clerk, perhaps, or a charlatan Juggler, a mountebank at a fair, who has laid out on a stand a laboratory of ill-assorted jars.

1976 , chapter 6, in William Weaver, transl., The Castle of Crossed Destinies, translation of Il castello dei destini incrociati by Italo Calvino, part 2, page 92

Donne was a mountebank who wrapped up his lack of meaning in hard words.

1928, Virginia Woolf, chapter 2, in Orlando: A Biography, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harcourt, Brace and Company, page 83

“Are you allowing yourselves to be fooled by this mountebank, this harlequin? Do you cringe before a religion compounded of clouds and moonbeams? This man is an imposter and the Galactic Spirit he speaks of a fraud of the imagination devised to——”

1951, Isaac Asimov, Foundation (1974 Panther Books Ltd publication), part III: “The Mayors”, chapter 7, page 106, ¶ 13

Gary Dahl, the man behind that scheme—described variously as a marketing genius and a genial mountebank—died on March 23 at 78.

2015 March 31, Margalit Fox, “Gary Dahl, Inventor of the Pet Rock, Dies at 78”, in The New York Times‎

They ſay this towne is full of coſenage: / As nimble Iuglers that deceiue the eie: / Darke working Sorcerers that change the minde: / Soule-killing Witches that deforme the bodie: / Diſguiſed Cheaters, prating Mountebankes, / And manie ſuch like liberties of ſinne:

c. 1594 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Comedie of Errors”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act I, scene ii], page 87, lines 97-102

As if Divinity had catch'd / The Itch, of purpose to be scratch'd; / Or, like a Mountebank, did wound / And stab her self with doubts profound, / Only to shew with how small pain / The sores of faith are cur'd again […]

1662, [Samuel Butler], “[The First Part of Hudibras]”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678; republished in A[lfred] R[ayney] Waller, editor, Hudibras: Written in the Time of the Late Wars, Cambridge: University Press, 1905

“We’re not going to have a Pendennis, the head of the house, marry a strolling mountebank from a booth. No, no, we won’t marry into Greenwich Fair, ma’am.” “We’re not going to have a Pendennis, the head of the house, marry a strolling mountebank from a booth. No, no, we won’t marry into Greenwich Fair, ma’am.”

1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter VII, in The History of Pendennis. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850

Ile Mountebanke their Loues, / Cogge their Hearts from them,

c. 1608–1609 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act III, scene ii], page 18, column 2