rascaldom

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English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

rascal +‎ -dom

Noun[edit]

rascaldom (usually uncountable, plural rascaldoms)

  1. The state of being a rascal.
  2. Rascals collectively.
    • 1870, Ralph Waldo Emerson, “The Comic”, in Letters and Social Aims (The Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson; VIII), Boston, New York: Houghton, Mifflin & Company, published 1903, page 130:
      Thus Falstaff, in Shakspeare, is a character of the broadest comedy, giving himself unreservedly to the senses, coolly ignoring the Reason, whilst he invokes its name, pretending to patriotism and to parental virtues, not with any intent to deceive, but only to make the fun perfect by enjoying the confusion betwixt reason and the negation of reason,—in other words, the rank rascaldom he is calling by its name.