hocus-pocus

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“
He was like a fortune-teller, only he's not telling me fortunes like a hocus-pocus lady in Quiapo.

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Definitions (11)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (4)

  1. noun Nonsense words or phrases used as a formula by quack conjurers.
  2. noun A trick performed by a magician or juggler; sleight-of-hand.
  3. noun Foolishness or empty pretense used especially to disguise deception or chicanery.
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Examples (50)

  • So it's just horrifying that Obama - and yes, the buck stops there - has decided to base his financial plan on the fantasy that a bit of financial hocus-pocus will turn the clock back to 2006. —  AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth
  • And no amount of financial hocus-pocus - for that is what the Geithner plan amounts to - will change that fact. —  Economist's View
  • But the bottom line is that the plan simply won't work because "no amount of financial hocus-pocus" will change the fact that "financial executives literally bet their banks on the belief that there was no housing bubble." —  Slate Magazine
  • And let us not get into hocus-pocus of 'open tendering' and 'legal transparency.'
  • Then fate intervenes in the form of a fairy godjanitor (Brian Doyle-Murray), who sprinkles a little hocus-pocus on a despondent Mike, bringing the movie's title to fruition and restoring Efron to the fore. —  LA Weekly | Complete Issue
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Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

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Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Possibly from an alteration of Latin hoc est corpus (meum), this is (my) body (words used in the Eucharist at the time of transubstantiation).

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. A sham-Latin riming formula, mere juggler’ jargon, variously reflected in D. hokus-bokus, G. Danish Swedish hokus-pokus, formerly also ockes-bockes, ockes boks, French hoccus-bocus, etc.; English also hoky-poky; cf. hanky-panky, of similar sense and origin. “According to Turner, in his ‘History of the Anglo-Saxons,’ from Ochus Bochus, a magician and demon of the Northern mythology; according to Tillotson, a corruption of hoc est corpus, uttered by Romish priests on the elevation of the host” (Webster's Diet.); but these are mere inventions of the fancy.
  2. from hocus-pocus, n.
 

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/ˈhoʊkəsˈpoʊkəs/
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