questionist
(ˈkwɛstjənɪst)
Also 7 -est.
[f. question v. + -ist.]
1. A habitual or professed questioner, spec. in theological matters. (In early use applied to certain of the schoolmen, as Aquinas and Duns Scotus.)
| 1523 [Coverdale] Old God & New (1534) R ij, Opiniators & questionistes braulynge and striuyng among them selues. 1528 Roy Rede Me (Arb.) 43 They sent thether Thomas and Scote With wother questionistes. a 1568 R. Ascham Scholem. (Arb.) 137 The worst of all, as Questionistes, and all the barbarous nation of scholemen. 1660 N. Ingelo Bentiv. & Ur. i. (1682) 142 They let alone the trifling niceties of Questionists. 1762 Gentl. Mag. 84 Your respectable rendezvous of curious questionists. 1812 Coleridge Lett., to his Wife (1895) 581 He is a fearful questionist, whenever he thinks he can pick up any information. 1874 Sylvester in Proc. Roy. Instit. VII. 184 note, A questionist in the ‘Educational Times’. |
2. Formerly, at Cambridge and Harvard: An undergraduate in his last term before proceeding to the degree of B.A.
| 1574 M. Stokys in Peacock Stat. Cambridge (1841) App. A. p. iv, The Questionists shall gyue the Bedels warnynge..that they may proclayme..thentrynge of their Questions. 1650 [see inceptor 1]. 1661 K. W. Conf. Charac. (1860) 95 A Petition of Questionests to Mr. Frost for their degrees. 1772 Jebb Remarks 20 The Examination of the Questionists; this being the appellation of the Students during the last six weeks of their preparation. 1887 Cambridge Univ. Cal. 64 If any Questionist have been prevented by illness from keeping all his terms, a Certificate must be delivered. |