mountebank

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The Word of the Day for November 9 is: 

mountebank   \MOUNT-ih-bank\   noun
     1: a person who sells quack medicines from a platform
    *2: a boastful unscrupulous pretender : charlatan

Example sentence:
     In his newspaper column, Gavin criticized the talk-radio 
host as "a mountebank whose 'expert' opinions and advice are 
complete hooey."

Did you know?
     "Mountebank" derives from the Italian "montimbanco," which 
was formed by combining the verb "montare" ("to mount"), the 
preposition "in" (converted to "im," meaning "in" or "on") and 
the noun "banco" ("bench"). Put these components together and 
you can deduce the literal origins of "mountebank" as someone 
mounted on a bench -- the "bench" being the platform on which 
charlatans from the 16th and 17th centuries would stand to sell 
their phony medicines. Mountebanks often included various forms 
of light entertainment on stage in order to attract customers. 
Later, extended uses of "mountebank" referred to someone who 
falsely claims to have knowledge about a particular subject or a 
person who simply pretends to be something he or she is not in 
order to gain attention.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.