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

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

From Middle English deceyte, from Old French deceite, deçoite, from decevoir (“to deceive”), from Latin dēcipere (“to cheat, mislead”).

deceit (countable and uncountable, plural deceits)

  1. An act or practice intended to deceive; a trick.
    Synonyms: trick, fraud
    The whole conversation was merely a deceit.
  2. An act of deceiving someone.
    Synonyms: deception, trickery; see also Thesaurus:deception
    • 1998, Mike Dixon-Kennedy, Encyclopedia of Greco-Roman Mythology, page 125:
      Upon his return he killed Eriphyle for her vanity and deceit of him and his father.
  3. (uncountable) The state of being deceitful or deceptive.
    Synonyms: deceptiveness, deceitfulness, dissimulation, fraudulence, trickery, underhandedness; see also Thesaurus:deceit
    • 1603 (date written), [Francis] Bacon, “Valerius Terminus: Of the Interpretation of Nature; with the Annotations of Hermes Stella. Chapter XI. The Chapter Immediately Following the Inventary; Being the 11th in Order, a Part thereof.”, in Robert Stephens, compiler, edited by [John Lockyer], Letters and Remains of the Lord Chancellor Bacon, London: […] W[illiam] Bowyer, published 1734, →OCLC, page 411:
      [T]he tvvo commended rules by him [Aristotle] ſet down, vvhereby the axioms of Sciences are precepted to be made convertible, and vvhich the latter men have not vvithout elegancy ſurnamed; the one the rule of truth, becauſe it preventeth deceipt; the other the rule of prudence, becauſe it freeth election, are the ſame thing in ſpeculation and affirmation, vvhich vve novv obſerve.
  4. (law) The tort or fraudulent representation of a material fact made with knowledge of its falsity, or recklessly, or without reasonable grounds for believing its truth and with intent to induce reliance on it; the plaintiff justifiably relies on the deception, to his injury.

act or behavior intended to deceive

act or fact of deceiving

state of being deceptive