sb. pl. Also 8 litterati. [L. litterātī, pl. of litterātus: see LITERATE.
In It. the word occurs in the same form (pl. of literato, now written litterato; also letterato). Possibly in the 17–18th c. the Eng. use may have been supposed by some to be derived from It. and not from Latin; early in the 18th c. LITERATO appears as the sing. beside LITERATUS.]
Men of letters; the learned class as a whole.
The earliest application in Eng. use is as the appellation of the learned class of China, which Burton obtained from the Latin version of the letters of the Jesuit M. Ricci, 1606–7. The word is still so employed by writers on China.
1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., To Rdr. (1624), 52. To be … examined & approued as the literati in China.
1664. Evelyn, trans. Freart’s Archit., etc. 132. An industrious searcher of the Sciences, which is the same that a good Philologer is amongst our Literati.
a. 1677. Hale, Prim. Orig. Man., I. ii. 63. These Sentiments are not confined to the Literati of mankind.
1714. Addison, Spect., No. 581, ¶ 33. I shall consult some Litterati on the project.
1787. M. Cutler, in Life, etc. (1888), I. 281. The University literati and men of fortune are become proprietors.
1803. Syd. Smith, Wks. (1859), I. 63/1. The list of Danish literati will best prove that they have no literati at all.
1809. W. Irving, Knickerb., III. iii. (1820), 174. Manifold are the tastes and dispositions of the enlightened literati, who turn over the pages of history.
1830. Carlyle, Misc. (1857), II. 137. Certain provincial literati of the Hof-district.
1860. R. D., in Galton’s Vac. Tour. (1861), 114. The literati of the southern Slaves are not to be found among a higher class than the village clergy, and masters of village-schools.
