Etymology

freedomite

Free·dom·ite
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Today it means: A member of a Christian zealot sect that split off from the Doukhobors, and which was involved in protests against certain policies of the Canadian government during the early to mid 20th century; the Doukhobors were a non-Orthodox religious group which emigrated from Russia to Canada at the end of the 19th century to escape persecution. Full definition →

Russian Свободник
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The story

  1. Russian · calque ofСвободник
  2. English todayFreedomite

From freedom + -ite (suffix forming nouns denoting adherents or followers of a specified doctrine, idea, movement, person, etc.), a calque of Russian Свободник (Svobodnik), from свобо́да (svobóda, “freedom, liberty”) + -ник (-nik, suffix creating masculine nouns, usually denoting a professional, performer, adherent, place, object, tool or a feature).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.