Dictionary

commonwealthman en · NOUN

Etymology

From commonwealth + man.

Meanings

1. (historical) Someone who lived under the English Commonwealth of the 17th century, especially an adherent of it; loosely, a republican.
   • Other radicals looked for inspiration to England again – though, interestingly, neither to Voltaire's commercial nor Montesquieu's constitutional paragon, but rather to the seventeenth-century Commonwealthmen. 2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin, published 2003, page 222:
   • Machiavelli had a decisive influence on the English political thinker and commonwealthman James Harrington, who in turn had an enormous impact on Irish patriots such as John Toland, Robert Molesworth and Francis Hutcheson. 2008, David Dwan, The Great Community, page 52:

Forms