mandarin
(en)
(noun) historically, a high government bureaucrat of the Chinese Empire OR a pedantic or elitist bureaucrat OR senior person of influence in academia or literary circles / (adj) deliberately superior or complex; esoteric, highbrow, obscurantist
the fiercely mandarin Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes
I knew it had something to do with Chinese bureaucrats but wasn't sure of the adjectival meaning
strange
9 years, 4 months ago