clodpole

plural clodpoles · alternative clodpoll · alternative clotpoll · alternative clotpole · alternative clodde-pole

1. derogatoryA stupid person; blockhead.

   “Are you sure it was Sam?” he asked. “I know the clodpole,” nodded Catweazle.

   1970, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 127

   3 more examples

   Therefore, this Letter being so excellently ignorant, will breed no terror in the youth: he will finde it comes from a Clodde-pole.

   c. 1601–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Twelfe Night, or What You Will”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iv]

   ‘Show the dullest clodpole,’ says my invaluable German friend, ‘show the haughtiest feather-head, that a soul higher than himself is here; were his knees stiffened into brass, he must down and worship.’

   1843 April, Thomas Carlyle, “VI, ’’The Landed’’”, in Past and Present, American edition, Boston, Mass.: Charles C[offin] Little and James Brown, published 1843, →OCLC, book IV (Horoscope)

   There lay Tom; hobnail Tom! a bacon-munching, reckless, beer-swilling animal! and yet a man; a dear brave human heart notwithstanding; capable of devotion and unselfishness. The boy's better spirit was touched, and it kindled his imagination to realize the abject figure of poor clodpole Tom, and surround it with a halo of mournful light.

   1859, George Meredith, chapter 9, in The Ordeal of Richard Feverel. A History of Father and Son. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC