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The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 (gcide)

Mountebank \Mount"e*bank\, v. t.
To cheat by boasting and false pretenses; to gull. [R.]
--Shak.
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Mountebank \Mount"e*bank\, v. i.
To play the mountebank.
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Mountebank \Mount"e*bank\, n. [It. montimbanco, montambanco;
montare to mount in in, upon banco bench. See {Mount},
and 4th {Bank}.]
1. One who mounts a bench or stage in the market or other
public place, boasts of his skill in curing diseases, and
vends medicines which he pretends are infallible remedies;
a quack doctor.
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Such is the weakness and easy credulity of men, that
a mountebank . . . is preferred before an able
physician. --Whitlock.
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2. Any boastful or false pretender; a charlatan; a quack.
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Nothing so impossible in nature but mountebanks will
undertake. --Arbuthnot.
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