puritan

Noun (1)

puritan (plural puritans)

1. (derogatory, usually) A puritanical person.
   • These new puritans have turned out to be surprisingly unskilled and inexperienced - very different from my generation who invented wife-swapping, orgies and free love in the late Sixties and early Seventies.2016 August 5, Janet Street-Porter, “Anxious young people may be having less sex than ever before, but we baby boomers are still obsessed with it”, in The Independent

Adjective (1)

puritan (comparative more puritan, superlative most puritan)

1. (derogatory, usually) Acting or behaving according to the Puritan morals (e.g. propagating modesty), especially with regard to pleasure, nudity and sex; ascetic.
   • A pietistic protestantism, rigid, self-righteous, unintellectual, obsessed with puritan morality to the point where hypocrisy was its automatic companion, dominated this desolate epoch.1962, Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution. 1789-1848, page 187

   Synonyms:

   prude, puritanical

Noun (2) capitalized: Puritan

US/ˈpjʊɹɪtən/UK/ˈpjʊəɹɪtən/

Puritan (plural Puritans)

1. A member of a particular Protestant religious sect advocating greater purity and piety.

Adjective (2) capitalized: Puritan

US/ˈpjʊɹɪtən/UK/ˈpjʊəɹɪtən/

Puritan (comparative more Puritan, superlative most Puritan)

1. Alternative letter-case form of puritan.
   • It’s a seedy time of the night and Jacky is telling me about sailors and their needs. A man called P. C. Alexander, an ex-Indian High-Commissioner in London has cleaned up Madras. There’s a very Puritan atmosphere here now, and the seamen are not happy. ‘All ship’s crew very happy with Calcutta....1989, Michael Palin, Around the World in 80 Days, BBC Books, →ISBN, page 111
   • Chardonnay is very malleable, but once we get the fruit in we actually take a very Puritan approach to it.2009, Melissa Stackhouse, “Conversations with Bigwigs: Melissa Stackhouse”, in Dara Moskowitz Grumdahl, Drink This: Wine Made Simple, New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, →ISBN, chapter 5 (Chardonnay...