An opsimath is a person who begins, or continues, to study or

learn Learning is the process of acquiring new understanding, knowledge, behaviors, skills, value (personal and cultural), values, Attitude (psychology), attitudes, and preferences. The ability to learn is possessed by humans, non-human animals, and ...

late in life. The word is derived from the

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

ὀψέ (), meaning 'late', and μανθάνω ('), meaning 'learn'. Opsimathy was once frowned upon, used as a put-down with implications of laziness, and considered less effective by educators than early learning. The emergence of "opsimath clubs" has demonstrated that opsimathy has shed much of this negative connotation.Glasgow Caledonian University speech
aggrandizing opsimathy. (URL accessed April 15, 2006) Notable opsimaths include 19th-century army officer and orientalist Sir Henry Rawlinson, Vivian Stanshall's fictitious character Sir Henry Rawlinson, Grandma Moses,

Rabbi Akiva Akiva ben Joseph (Mishnaic Hebrew: ; – 28 September 135 CE), also known as Rabbi Akiva (), was a leading Jewish scholar and sage, a '' tanna'' of the latter part of the first century and the beginning of the second. Rabbi Akiva was a leadin ...

(according to the

Talmud The Talmud (; ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of Haskalah#Effects, modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cen ...

, he began studying at age 40), and

Cato the Elder Marcus Porcius Cato (, ; 234–149 BC), also known as Cato the Censor (), the Elder and the Wise, was a Roman soldier, Roman Senate, senator, and Roman historiography, historian known for his conservatism and opposition to Hellenization. He wa ...

, who learned

only at the age of 80.

References

alternative education {{Edu-stub