[f. WONDER sb. + MONGER1 2.] One who deals in wonders; a wonder-worker, or relater of wonders.
1612. Bp. Hall, Contempl., O. T., IV. iv. How are the great wonder-mongers of Egypt abashed.
1651. Wittie, trans. Primrose’s Pop. Err., 436. Those Wondermongers cannot take away the Kings evill.
1745. Eliza Haywood, Female Spect., No. 18 (1748), III. 281. Invention! cried our wonder-monger, do I not tell you, sir,… that I saw it with my own eyes!
1751. Lavington, Enthus. Meth. & Papists, II. III. (1754), Pref. One [Chapel] may be dedicated to the God Proteus (as was in the Days of Paganism) famous for being a juggling Wonder-monger, and turning himself into all Shapes.
1851. J. H. Newman, Lect. Pres. Pos. Cath., 231. Future story-tellers and wonder-mongers, as yet unknown to fame, are below the horizon.
1863. De Morgan, Pref., in From Matter to Spirit, p. xii. That some tricky wonder-monger bad stuck the bill of a duck upon the neck of a quadruped.
1867. Swinburne, Blake (1868), 94. No wonder-monger of the low sort need here have hoped for a pupil.
Hence Wonder-mongering.
1886. Gurney, etc., Phantasms of Living, I. 128. Another instinct which tends directly to discourage wonder-mongering.
1911. W. De Morgan, Likely Story, iv. 112. That numerous class of persons which, when its attention turns towards wondermongering of any sort, loses its head promptly.
