Good point. I used to heavily criticize rote memorization for being distinct from intelligence because: school. It's painful to go through so many years of school where everyone is seemingly complicit on rote memorization being equal to "winning".

I grew up, and it still pains me but I had it better explained to me that memorizing things doesn't equal intelligence, but those people that remember a lot have a much larger pool of information to draw upon. So whatever definition I use for intelligence, like synthesis, well, a large pool of information to draw from probably helps a whole lot.