pompatus

P3O1M3P3A1T1U1S1

noun

One who is pompous or splendid.

Scrabble 14
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Meanings

noun
  1. nonce wordOne who is pompous or splendid.

    Ryan Mallett is the pompatus of offense.

    2014 November 6, Barryfromtexas, “Week 9 Thingy - Not Enough Heh to Go Around (Now with grammarfication)”, in SBNation
    3 more examples

    She loved the way the lecturer stated it, offhand, but with the air of a pompatus.

    2000, Michael Ondaatje, Anil's Ghost, Picador,, →ISBN, page 140

    It's a good job there was no need for a baseball infographic about “The joker” because I'd have been forced to use a terrible pun: the pompatus of glove.

    2011, Craig Robinson, Flip Flop Fly Ball: An Infographic Baseball Adventure, →ISBN

    “And my mom is the pompatus of love,” Will said.

    2015, Suanne Laqueur, Give Me Your Answer True, →ISBN
  2. nonce wordPomp, ostentatiousness, or spectacle.

    All the pompatus of war. It would come.

    2015, John Hornor Jacobs, Foreign Devils, →ISBN
    3 more examples

    It could be a whang-dang-doodle, a cloche hat made out of coyote fur, or a phylactery testifying to the pompatus of love.

    2004, Michael Chabon, Michael Mignola, McSweeney's Enchanted Chamber of Astonishing Stories, →ISBN, page 84

    Got my pompatus up; my rave'll be on in a few. I must have popped too many; the Iowa donkeys are starting to bray in my ears.

    2010, Loren Berengere, Satirical Denouncements of the Wicked Americans and We Anti-Matriarchalists, page 98

    If you're into the pompatus of Twitter, send email to […] and I'll sign you up for the newsletter that alerts you when the week's poll is posted.

    2015 June 26, Eric Zorn, “What same-sex marriage backers 'lost'”, in Chicago Tribune

Origin

First used in the lyrics of the Steve Miller Band's 1972 song "Enter Maurice" ("whisper sweet words of epismetology in your ear and speak to you of the pompatus of love.") and popularized in their 1973 song "The Joker" ("Cause I speak of the pompatus of love"), but having no apparent meaning in either song. The lyric was inspired by the lyric "Oh my darling, let me whisper sweet words of pizmotality and discuss the puppetutes of love" in The Medallions' "The Letter" written by Vernon Green; puppetutes, from puppet, described a fantasy paper-doll or puppet-like girl.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

pompatus. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/pompatus

MLA

“pompatus.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/pompatus. Accessed November 2, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “pompatus,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/pompatus.

Source: pompatus on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.