- 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."
- cad
- 1730, shortening of cadet (q.v.); originally used of servants, then (1831) of town boys by students at British universities and public schools (though at Cambridge it meant "snob"). Meaning "person lacking in finer feelings" is from 1838.
"A cad used to be a jumped-up member of the lower classes who was guilty of behaving as if he didn't know that his lowly origin made him unfit for having sexual relationships with well-bred women." [Anthony West, "H.G. Wells: Aspects of a Life," 1984]
- wine
- O.E. win, from P.Gmc. *winam (cf. O.S., O.Fris., O.H.G. win, O.N. vin, Du. wijn, Ger. Wein), an early borrowing from L. vinum "wine," from PIE *win-o-, from an Italic noun related to words for "wine" in Gk. (oinos), Armenian, Hittite, and non-I.E. Georgian and West Semitic (cf. Arabic wain, Heb. yayin), probably from a lost Mediterranean language word *win-/*woin- "wine." Also from L. vinum are O.C.S. vino, Lith. vynas, Welsh gwin, O.Ir. fin. Essentially the same word as vine (q.v.). The verb meaning "entertain with wine" is attested from 1862. Winery first recorded 1882, Amer.Eng. Wine snob is recorded from 1951.