deipnosophist \dyp-NOS-uh-fist\
noun: Someone who is skilled in table talk.
noun: Someone who is skilled in table talk.
Deipnosophist comes from the title of a work written by the Greek Athenaeus in about 228 AD, Deipnosophistai, in which a number of wise men sit at a dinner table and discuss a wide range of topics. It is derived from deipnon, "dinner" + sophistas, "a clever or wise man."
At the age of six his future as a deipnosophist seemed certain. Guzzling filched apples he loved to prattle. Hogging the pie he invariably piped up and rattled on. -- Ellis Sharp, "The Bloating of Nellcock"
Ellis Sharp: " 'The Bloating of Nellcock' (in The Aleppo Button) was an attack on Labour leader Neil Kinnock, who is now a marginal, unimportant, increasingly forgotten figure. But Nellcock has a life of his own as a grotesque fictional creation whose misadventures have a comic reality, long after the original inspiration has faded from view."
Dictionary.com Entry and Pronunciation for deipnosophist
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