funambulist
(fjuːˈnæmbjʊlɪst)
[f. as prec. + -ist.]
A performer on the tight (or slack) rope, a rope-walker, a rope-dancer.
| 1793 Looker-on No. 80 ¶3 What man will withhold from the funambulist the praise of justice, who considers his inflexible uprightness? 1824 Heber Jrnl. (ed. 2) II. xx. 334 Tricks which proved him to be a funambulist of considerable merit. 1847–8 De Quincey Protestantism Wks. VIII. 95 That would be a sad task for the most skilful of funambulists or theological tumblers. 1896 Daily News 1 Sept. 3 A Funambulist is a gentleman who..on a rope..turns sommersaults, leaps thro' a ring, and plays on a fiddle while whirling like a Catharine wheel. |
So fuˈnambulism [see -ism], rope-walking.
| 1824 De Quincey Conversation Wks. 1890 X. 280 A sort of monster hired to play tricks of funambulism for the night. 1886 A. Jessopp in Athenæum 20 Feb. 264 Horrible lessons of ghastly grammar and dreary funambulism yclept analysis of the sentence. |