Origin of Ignoramus

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Shelby Garcia.

Well, hi, Shelby. Welcome to the program. Where are you calling from?

Midlothian.

Where?

Midlothian. People always have to ask me to say that twice.

What state is that?

It’s in Texas, and it’s actually south of Dallas.

So what’s going on down there in Midlothian?

Well, actually, my dad and I were very curious about the word ignoramus. My father’s last name, my maiden name, is actually Ramos, but in this area, very country area, they pronounce it Ramus.

Naturally, yeah, he was always teased. I think he actually said they used to call him Igna in school.

And so with that negative connotation, we were just kind of curious really where that word came from and what it means exactly. Because I’ve only heard it used negatively, so I’m just curious.

They called him Igna Ramos.

Yeah, it’s really Lamos if you pronounce it correctly.

Right.

Because it’s a Spanish last name.

Sure.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Wow.

Well, you and your dad can tell people that the story behind this word is actually really interesting. And it involves a Latin word, which is, of course, related to Spanish. And it involves a comedy from the 17th century.

So here’s the deal. Ignoramus in Latin is we are ignorant. And it used to be in the English judicial system that if a grand jury didn’t have enough evidence to indict somebody, they would write that on the back of the brief. They would say ignoramos, meaning we don’t know if there’s enough evidence to convict somebody.

So it’s sort of the Latin way of saying. And then in 1615, there was a guy named George Ruggle who decided to make fun of lawyers. And he wrote a farce that was called Ignoramus. And the lead character in it was a lawyer. And that’s what they called him. Ignoramus.

Yeah, or Ignoramus. I don’t know how they were pronouncing it back in the same way. I’ve heard it pronounced both ways.

Yeah, yeah. Well, they were pronouncing it one way or the other back in the 17th century. But it was this play that was mostly in Latin. It had some English, and it must have been a real knee slapper because it went on for six hours.

So anyway, I don’t know if that’s any comfort, but the fact is that this word, ignoramus, does have sort of a long and illustrious history. I mean, it’s kind of interesting, isn’t it, that it comes from Latin?

It does mean a dummy, though. It does mean a dummy. It’s never been used in a nice way, and not since it left the legal circles.

Yeah. I’m not sure it’s that much comfort.

It’s okay. It’s funny. It’s good to know anyway because I’ve never, and I wasn’t able to find much on the Internet. So that’s good. Thank you for that.

Yeah. The Internet has holes. We try to fill them.

Well, thank you so much. I appreciate it. We enjoy your show a lot.

I’m glad to hear it, Shelby. Thanks for calling.

Thank you so much. Clearly you’re not an ignoramus.

No, I would hope not.

Thank you.

All right. Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

If you’ve got a question about an origin of a word, give us a call, 1-877-929-9673. And don’t forget that you can follow us on Twitter at twitter.com slash Wayword.