high-muck-a-muck N. Amer. colloq.
(ˈhaɪˌmʌkəmʌk)
Also high-you-muck-a-muck.
[app. ad. Chinook Jargon hiu plenty + mucka-muck food.]
A self-important person, one who imagines he is more exalted than he is.
| 1856 Democratic State Jrnl. (Sacramento) 1 Nov. 3/1 The professors—the high ‘Muck-a-Mucks’—tried fusion, and produced confusion. 1866 ‘Mark Twain’ Lett. fr. Hawaii (1967) 32 Not if I was High-You-Muck-a-Muck and King of Wawhoo. 1869 ― Sk. New & Old (1875) 69 High Muck-a-mucks, the paleface from the land of the setting sun greets you! 1879 C. E. S. Wood Jrnl. 13 Feb. in Oreg. Hist. Q. (1969) LXX. 144 Go to Thompsons 2 bit house, no deception there, hi you muck a muck and here's your bill of fare. 1920 S. Lewis Main Street 117 He looks at me like he wants me to remember he's a highmuckamuck and worth two hundred thousand dollars. 1927 A. Philip Painted Cliff 14 J. B. Smith is the high muck-a-muck, the tyee of the mining business of British Columbia. 1947 Chicago Tribune 21 Dec. (Comics section) 8 They's a highmuckymuck in th'radio business vacationin' here, so we gotta be good. 1965 Time (Canad. ed.) 16 Apr. 14/3 Not all the Liberal high muckamucks were as warmly defended as Favreau. |