Brewer's: Cunctator

[the delayer ]. Quintus Fabius Maximus, the Roman general who baffled Hannibal by avoiding direct engagements, and wearing him out by marches, countermarches, and skirmishes from a distance. This was the policy by which Duguesclin forced the English to abandon their possessions in France in the reign of Charles V. (le Sage). (See Fabian.)

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
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