"student or expert in anthropology," 1798, from anthropology + -ist. Attested from 1783 in German.
Entries linking to anthropologist
anthropology n.
"science of the natural history of man," 1590s, originally especially of the relation between physiology and psychology, from Modern Latin anthropologia or coined independently in English from anthropo- + -logy. In Aristotle, anthrōpologos is used literally, as "speaking of man." Related: Anthropologic; anthropological.
-ist
word-forming element meaning "one who does or makes," also used to indicate adherence to a certain doctrine or custom, from French -iste and directly from Latin -ista (source also of Spanish, Portuguese, Italian -ista), from Greek agent-noun ending -istes, which is from -is-, ending of the stem of verbs in -izein, + agential suffix -tes.
Variant -ister (as in chorister, barrister) is from Old French -istre, on false analogy of ministre. Variant -ista is from Spanish, popularized in American English 1970s by names of Latin-American revolutionary movements.