snob 1781, "a shoemaker, a shoemaker's apprentice," of unknown origin. It came to be used in Cambridge University slang c.1796 for "townsman, local merchant," and by 1831 it was being used for "person of the ordinary or lower classes." Meaning "person who vulgarly apes his social superiors" arose 1843, popularized 1848 by William Thackeray's "Book of Snobs." The meaning later broadened to include those who insist on their gentility, in addition to those who merely aspire to it, and by 1911 had its main modern sense of "one who despises those considered inferior in rank, attainment, or taste." - Halil

There's a lot of this going around in society, both in the real world "and" the cyber world; some of it innocent, but most of it is malicious! - Halil

It's remarkable to me how many words we take as basic are relatively recent. - Spidra Webster

I'm sad to discover that the s.nob. being short for "sin nobilitas" explanation is wrong. it was such a beautiful etymology :) - Eivind

Dammit, Eivind, quit rubbing your fluent multi-lingualism in my face! ;-P - Spidra Webster

I'm not even completely fluent in Norwegian anymore, Spidra. It all gets confused :) - Eivind

I was surprised to find Pimsleur offers neither Swedish nor Danish but offers Norwegian. If Norwegian is *the* Scandinavian language to know, I'm screwed. The spelling confuses me after learning the other two! - Spidra Webster