Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To cause to believe what is not true; mislead.
- v. Archaic To catch by guile; ensnare.
- v. To practice deceit.
- v. To give a false impression: appearances can deceive.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To mislead by a false appearance or statement; cause to believe what is false, or to disbelieve what is true; delude.
- To cause to fail in fulfilment or realization; frustrate or disappoint.
- . To take from; rob stealthily.
- To cause to pass; while away.
- Synonyms To beguile, cheat, overreach, circumvent, dupe, fool, gull, cozen, hoodwink.
- In fencing, to evade, as an attack or parry, thus causing an opponent to lose the contact or feel of one's foil.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To lead into error; to cause to believe what is false, or disbelieve what is true; to impose upon; to mislead; to cheat; to disappoint; to delude; to insnare.
- v. To beguile; to amuse, so as to divert the attention; to while away; to take away as if by deception.
- v. obsolete To deprive by fraud or stealth; to defraud.
WordNet 3.0
- v. cause someone to believe an untruth
- v. be false to; be dishonest with
Etymologies
- Middle English deceyven, from Old French deceivre (Modern French décevoir), from Latin decipere ("to deceive, beguile, entrap"), from de- ("from") + capere ("to seize"); see captive. Compare conceive, perceive, receive. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English deceiven, from Old French deceveir, from Vulgar Latin *dēcipēre, from Latin dēcipere, to ensnare, deceive : dē-, de- + capere, to seize; see kap- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“I myself am very fond of the plain cheese pizza, but don't let the name deceive you.”
“Appearances, however, which have been deceptive before, may again deceive; and the history of nations teams with proofs that when once they have overstepped the bounds of reason, albeit with the purpose of returning when their ends shall have been accomplished, the very events which their own passion has produced frequently raise a barrier against their retreat, and nulla vestigia retrorsum becomes their doom.”
“Sinners herein deceive themselves, for, though the sentence be not executed speedily, it will be executed the more severely at last.”
Commentary on the Whole Bible Volume III (Job to Song of Solomon)
“(don't let the name deceive you, it just monitors bandwidth of your phone's data connection, regardless of the way it connects, be it HSDPA, 3G, GPRS etc).”
“h. 264, "Ipod video" (. m4v): Don't let the name deceive you!”
“Baltar’s ability to deceive is clearly second-nature, do we really want to find out what else he’s been hiding?”
“Thomas Paine, during the Revolutionary War, argued in The Crisis that there are serious moments in the life of a country when "to deceive is to destroy; and it is of little consequence, in the conclusion, whether men deceive themselves, or submit, by a kind of mutual consent, to the impositions of each other.”
The Huffington Post: Tony Blankley: Afghan War Becoming a Bloody Farce
“I made this cake about three weeks ago for no particular reason other than I wanted to make a plain 'homey' cake but don't let the simplicity of the name deceive you.”
“You can use eyeballs for many things but they often deceive, which is what this weblog is about.”
“ARI FLEISCHER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Sometimes one of the best ways to hide or to deceive is to come out with such a voluminous document that it makes people miss the things that aren't in there.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘deceive’.
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RELI - Genesis
Protagonists and relevant words in the Book of Creation (Source: King James Bible)
Laban, circumcise, beget, Esau, Rebekah, speckle, Sodom, Pharaoh, Canaanite, Canaan, Jacob, Lot and 1286 more...
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bad memory
copper, anvil, oblique, thrust, shrine, welfare, farewell, bitter, faction, sectarian, tangible, spectacle and 134 more...
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EN - eesily missspellable wirds
accessible, accommodate, achievement, acquaintance, address, advertisement, alleged, athletics, attendance, auxiliary, believe, challenge and 118 more...
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RELI - words with Biblical connotations
Words in the Bible evoking biblical stories or with special spiritual meaning. Proper names have been reduced to the minimum.
ark, judgement, holy, saint, baptism, spirit, love, eternal, altar, balsam, covenant, flood and 1115 more...
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common UA vocab. in US
Interesting, there is a traditional vocabulary of an Ukrainian, that differs from vocabulary of average American. It would be nice to explore it.
jackdaw, incongruous, cassock, vivid, magpie, humdrum, amongst, wonder, wandering, wheedling, wheedle, osseous and 368 more...
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English
rewarding, wit, landmark, core, soar, drop, plunge, plummet, dive, level off, rocket, peak and 110 more...
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Rilakkuma's list
The Velvetine Ruffians
gamine, waif, ruffian, villain, rake, libertine, velvetine, luminary, nom de plume, street urchin, epicurean, eventide and 256 more...
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kenzie's Words
epiphany, rhapsody, melody, cacophany, zenith, meticulous, sly, portent, synchronicity, juggernaut, evensong, script and 99 more...
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my dictionary
able, abnormally, abroad, absent, abstract, acceptable, acceptance, access, accessible, accession, according to, account and 4551 more...
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The List Of Words That Rewrote The Hi...
Ah, yeah, this is a list of words that I think sound pretty funny... or dumb, either way, I like 'em so, yeah.
flabergasted, smash, wang, wordie, drum, rumplestiltskin, resistance, watt, hindu, universal serial bus, bearing, nematode and 138 more...
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frequent toefl
Words that I do not know or unsure for toefl
appurtenances, aptitude, arbitrary, arboretum, argot, arrears, avocation, avuncular, badger, bait, warden, bane and 428 more...
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General
attain, stretch, lever, flock, fraught, taunt, dub, deceive, toss, sentient, stale, brew and 52 more...
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konoka's Words
volatile, erudite, deux ex machina, 1337, etymology, ensnare, wanderlust, miscreant, archaic, erotic, purloin, vernacular and 56 more...
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love
love love love
sleepless, dreams, restless, heartache, liebe, feelings, thoughts, death, lifeless, sad, sadness, pain and 45 more...
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Aya
Tweets
Looking for tweets for deceive.
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