truant
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truant¹
- /ˈtɹuːənt/ UK
- /ˈtɹuənt/ US
Rhymes with -uːənt
Where it comes from
The adjective and noun are derived from Middle English truant, truand, truaund (“(adjective) idle; tending to vagrancy (uncertain; may be a use of the noun); (noun) beggar; mendicant friar; vagrant, wanderer; worthless person, rogue, scoundrel; one who is absent without leave, truant; one who shirks duties”), from Old French truant, truand (“(adjective) beggarly; roguish; (noun) a beggar, vagabond; a rogue”) (modern French truand), probably of Celtic origin, possibly from Gaulish *trugan, or from Breton truan (“wretched”), from Proto-Celtic *taratrom, from Proto-Indo-European *térh₁-tro-m, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *terh₁- (“to drill, pierce; to rub; to turn”).
Cognates
* Breton truc (“beggar”)
* Irish trogán, trogha (“destitute”)
* Middle Dutch trawant, trouwant, truwant
* Occitan truan
* Portuguese truão
* Scottish Gaelic trudanach (“vagabond”), truaghan (“wretched”)
* Spanish truhan
* Welsh tru, truan (“wretched”)
adjective
- Shirking or wandering from business or duty; straying; hence, idle; loitering. Ham[let]. And vvhat in faith make you from VVittenberg? / Hora[tio]. A truant diſpoſition good my Lord.
- Of a student: absent from school without permission. He didn’t graduate because he was chronically truant and didn’t have enough attendances to meet the requirement.
- Having no real substance; unimportant, vain, worthless.
noun truants
-
An idle or lazy person; an idler.
For my part I may ſpeake it to my ſhame, / I haue a truant beene to Chiualrie, […]
Similar: bum, couch potato, dawdler, deadbeat, dogfucker, do-naught, do-nothing, dosser, idler, idleton, faineant, flaneur
- A student who is absent from school without permission; hence (figurative), a person who shirks or wanders from business or duty. [S]ince I pluckt Geeſe, plaide Trevvant, and vvhipt Top, I knevv not vvhat 'tvvas to be beaten, till lately.
-
Synonym of sturdy beggar (“a person who was fit and able to work, but lived as a beggar or vagrant instead”); hence, a worthless person; a rogue, a scoundrel.
Hang him truant, theres no true drop of bloud in him to be truly toucht vvith loue, if he be ſadde, he vvantes money.
Similar: bum, stiff, casual, clochard, derelict, dero, down-and-out, down-and-outer, drifter, epithite, floater, gadling
truant²
- /ˈtɹuːənt/ UK
- /ˈtɹuənt/ US
Rhymes with -uːənt
Where it comes from
Inherited from Middle English truaunten (“to obtain alms fraudulently; to behave like a rogue or scoundrel; to neglect a duty; to be idle or lazy”), and then partly:
* from Old French truander (modern French truander (“to cheat, to con”)), from truand (noun) (see etymology 1) + -er (suffix forming infinitives of first-conjugation verbs); and
* from Middle English truaunt (noun) (see etymology 1) + -en (suffix forming infinitives of verbs).
verb truants · truanting · truanted
- Also used with the impersonal pronoun it (dated): to shirk or wander from business or duty; (specifically) of a student: to be absent from school without permission; to play truant. The number of schoolchildren known to have truanted from this school has been unusually high.
- To idle away or waste (time). I dare not be the Author / Of trevvanting the time then, neither vvill I.
Translations
Every language
adj shirking or wandering from business or duty
| Deutsch | herumgammelnd, herumhängend, herumlungernd |
|---|
adj of a student: absent from school without permission
| Español | absentista |
|---|---|
| Português | gazeteiro |
| Deutsch | am Schwänzen, schulschwänzend |
| Italiano | pigro |
| Русский | прогу́ливающий progúlivajuščij, прогу́льщик progúlʹščik, прогу́льщица progúlʹščica |
| العربية | مُتَغَيِّب mutaḡayyib |
noun student who is absent from school without permission; person who shirks or wanders from business or duty
| Español | absentista, novillero, novillera |
|---|---|
| 中文 | 曠課者 /旷课者 kuàngkèzhě |
| Deutsch | Schwänzer, Schwänzerin, Schulschwänzer, Schulschwänzerin |
| Русский | прогу́льщик progúlʹščik, прогу́льщица progúlʹščica |
Talk about this word "truant." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/truant. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026. truant. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/truant "truant." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/truant.Cite this
@misc{truant_2026,
title = {truant},
howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
year = {2026},
url = {https://micwyn.com/word/truant},
urldate = {2026-11-06}
}
