Synonyms 1. uninstructed, untutored, untaught. Ignorant, illiterate, unlettered, uneducated mean lacking in knowledge or in training. Ignorant may mean knowing little or nothing, or it may mean uninformed about a particular subject: An ignorant person can be dangerous. I confess I'm ignorant of mathematics.Illiterate originally meant lacking a knowledge of literature or similar learning, but is most often applied now to one unable to read or write: necessary training for illiterate soldiers.Unlettered emphasizes the idea of being without knowledge of literature: unlettered though highly trained in science.Uneducated refers especially to lack of schooling or to lack of access to a body of knowledge equivalent to that learned in schools: uneducated but highly intelligent.2. unenlightened.
a calculus or concretion found in the stomach or intestines of certain animals, esp. ruminants, formerly reputed to be an effective remedy for poison.
a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces, designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after a rhetorical question.
a gadget; dingus; thingumbob.
a screen or mat covered with a dark material for shielding a camera lens from excess light or glare.
a children's mummer's parade, as on the Fourth of July, with prizes for the best costumes.
late 14c., from O.Fr. ignorant, from L. ignorantia, from ignorantem, prp. of ignorare from in- "not" + Old L. gnarus "aware, acquainted with," from Porot-L. suffixed form *gno-ro-, related to gnoscere "to know" (see know). Form influenced by ignotus "unknown." Cf. also
uncouth. Colloquial sense of "ill-mannered" first attested 1886.