rare. [L. lit(t)erātus, f. littera letter.] One of the LITERATI; a man of letters or erudition; a learned man. Cf. LITERATO.
1704. Hearne, Duct. Hist. (1714), I. 401. It is … not a sufficient Reason to decry it so much as a late Ingenious Literatus has done.
1806. Lamb, Lett., viii. To Mr. Rickman, 79. You do not happen to have any place at your disposal which would suit a decayed Literatus?
1823. De Quincey, Lett. Yng. Man, i. Wks. 1890, X. 19. Now we are to consider that our bright ideal of a literatus may chance to be married.
