confess - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

From Middle English confessen, from Anglo-Norman confesser, from Old French confesser, from Latin confessus (Old French confés), past participle of cōnfiteor (“to confess, admit”) from con- + fateor (“to admit”). Displaced Middle English andetten (“to confess, admit”) (from Old English andettan). Doublet of confiteor.

Sense 6 is a calque of 告白 (kokuhaku).

confess (third-person singular simple present confesses, present participle confessing, simple past and past participle confessed)

  1. (intransitive, transitive) To admit to the truth, particularly in the context of sins or crimes committed.
    I confess to spray-painting all over that mural!
    I confess that I am a sinner.
    • c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:
      I never gave it him. Send for him hither, / And let him confess a truth.
    • 1667, John Milton, “Book IX”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
      And there confess / Humbly our faults, and pardon beg.
    • 1705, J[oseph] Addison, Remarks on Several Parts of Italy, &c. in the Years 1701, 1702, 1703, London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
      I must confess I was most pleased with a beautiful prospect that none of them have mentioned.
    • 2012 October 8, Susan Candiotti and Jason Carroll, “Jerry Sandusky proclaims his innocence in jailhouse audio recording”, in CNN‎[1]:
      Sandusky needs to confess his guilt, said an attorney for the person identified in court as Victim No. 4.
    • 2023 June 2, Cheri Mossburg, Andi Babineau and Christal Hayes, “‘I’m just tired of covering it up’: Guilt drives man to confess to murder 15 years after killing, police say”, in CNN‎[2]:
      In an emotional scene captured on police body camera, he repeatedly confesses to Blodgett’s killing, even telling authorities the weapon he used and where he buried the victim’s body, the arrest affidavit states.
    • 2024 September 5, Rachel Clarke and Shimon Prokupecz, “Police pressured him to confess to a murder that never happened”, in CNN‎[3]:
      Thirty-six hours later, Perez was on a psychiatric hold in a hospital, having been pressured into confessing he killed his dad and trying to take his own life. […] Judge Gee said the detectives’ tactics “indisputably led to Perez’s subjective confusion and disorientation, to the point that he falsely confessed to killing his father, and tried to take his own life.”
  2. (transitive) To acknowledge faith in; to profess belief in.
  3. (religion) To unburden (oneself) of sins to God or a priest, in order to receive absolution.
  4. (transitive, religion) To hear or receive such a confession of sins from.
    • 1523–1525, John Bourchier, 2nd Baron Berners (translator), Froissart's Chronicles
      He […] heard mass, and the prince, his son, with him, and the most part of his company were confessed.
    • 1867, W. K. Kelly, The Decameron: or ten day's entertainment of Boccaccio. A revised translation‎[4]:
      A jealous man confesses his wife under a priest's habit, who tells him that she is visited every night by a friar; […]
  5. (transitive) To disclose or reveal.
  6. (intransitive, chiefly in the context of Japanese media or informal) To profess one's love.

to admit to the truth

to disclose everything to a Catholic priest

to acknowledge faith in

to hear or receive a confession of sins from

to disclose or reveal