Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Deliberate breach of faith; calculated violation of trust; treachery: "the fink, whose perfidy was equaled only by his gall” ( Gilbert Millstein).
- n. The act or an instance of treachery.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Breach of faith or trust; hase treachery; faithlessness.
- n. Synonyms See perfidious.
Wiktionary
- n. A state or act of violating faith or allegiance; violation of a promise or vow, or of trust reposed; faithlessness; treachery.
- n. law Specifically, in warfare, an illegitimate act of deception, such as using symbols like the Red Cross or white flag to gain proximity to an enemy for purposes of attack.
- n. A state or act of deceit.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The act of violating faith or allegiance; violation of a promise or vow, or of trust reposed; faithlessness; treachery.
WordNet 3.0
- n. an act of deliberate betrayal
- n. betrayal of a trust
Etymologies
- From Latin perfidus ("faithless, treacherous, false"), from fides ("faith"); related to, for example, English fidelity. (Wiktionary)
- Latin perfidia, from perfidus, treacherous : per-, to destruction; see per- + fidēs, faith. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“But much as she loved England she was very loud in denouncing what she called the perfidy of the mother to the brightest of her children.”
“One that routinely engages in perfidy, intentionally targets civilians, uses hospitals, schools and mosques to hide and fire rockets, transports its soldiers and material using ambulances marked with the red crescent, refuses to abide by a unified command structure, refuses to wear distinctive insignia, .... is not comparable to a “freedom fighter” in any respect except the trivial.”
“The day the nadir of his perfidy is brought to light, he will effectively have put the lives of hundreds of thousands — maybe even millions of Americans and more worrisome to him — American Interests (“Cha-CHING!”) in exponentially greater jeopardy than before.”
“I await the response of someone that believes that perfidy is acceptable in killing Mr. Awlaki.”
The Volokh Conspiracy » Opinio Juris Discussions of Targeting of US Citizen
“In my readings of British history generally, the word perfidy arises quite often.”
On Thursday, the Legg report will be published along with...
“It would be naive to think that human perfidy is not capable of depriving some of its members of these ingredients so that they can do no more and must depart.”
“Beria was more treacherous, more practiced in perfidy and cunning, more insolent and single-minded, than my father.”
“But the major perfidy is American, since at various stages C.I.A. agents are working both with and against Uighur separatists, the Chinese government, Britons and one another.”
“Its videos praise fighters and rocket-launching teams; its broadcasts insult the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, for talking to Israel and the United States; its children’s programs praise “martyrdom,” teach what it calls the perfidy of the Jews and the need to end Israeli occupation over Palestinian land, meaning any part of the state of Israel. posted by GayandRight @ 10:37 AM”
““Though I can still suffer when I recall her perfidy, I still laugh at her expression of entire conviction and sweet satisfaction that I must die, or at any rate sink into perpetual melancholy,” de Marsay went on.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘perfidy’.
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Test Prep or Just for fun
Building a list for standardized test prep or just for learning some new words! Please add any words that you feel are important for the SAT/GRE/GMAT etc...
throng, morass, parley, facile, kismet, strife, jetsam, carrion, annex, harbinger, vestige, surreptitious and 575 more...
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My first list
exposition, anecdote, perspicacious, polemic, imbroglio, irascible, vicissitude, venality, payola, amatory, caliginous, avuncular and 5 more...
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JURI - crimes and offences
Don't commit any of these if you can
firearms trafficking, serious and organ..., trafficking in hu..., illegal shipment ..., cybercrime, money laundering, sale of counterfe..., sale of dangerous..., smuggling, infraction, corruption, organised crime and 153 more...
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SAT 2
platitude, parsimonious, perspicacious, catharsis, captious, munificent, penurious, arid, portentous, ossified, nascent, perfidy and 13 more...
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Jesse's random
bathos, dragoman, tessellated, escutcheon, eikon, mondaine, basilisk, ciborium, rubric, machicolation, jet, defalcation and 198 more...
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JURI - courtroom speak
Legal glossary with special focus on courtroom vocabulary
accused, acquittal, ADA, adjournment, adjudication, affidavit, affirmed, aggravated range, aggravating factors, allegation, alleged, answer and 794 more...
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GRE
GRE words from Princeton Review guide, ETS GRE Book from 2010 (for revised test), New Yorker/NY Times articles.
sycophant, obsequious, volubility, equanimity, enervate, effrontery, impertinent, platitude, impudence, quiescent, propitiate, equivocate and 124 more...
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GRE Practice
coruscate, preternatural, preclude, retrench, perfidy, sophistry, sedulous, martinet, churlish, dissembler, prevarication, impugn and 38 more...
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GRE Words From GRE Tests
risqué, wafted, improvisation, retrench, rebuked, perfidy, sophistry, sedulous, coruscate, debilitating, preternatural, teleological and 5 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
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gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1908 more...
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magoosh1
aberration, aboveboard, abysmal, ace, affable, aghast, alacrity, ambiguous, ambivalent, ameliorate, amenable, amiable and 222 more...
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word tank
a couple words
logolepsy, nefarious, quintessential, tintinnabulation, serendipity, rhapsody, palimpsest, panoply, mellifluous, imbue, loquacious, garrulous and 174 more...
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my GRE words
pedant, wizened, histrionic, logorrhea, frenetic, approbation, quibble, knell, acclivity, droog, prevarication, aplomb and 182 more...
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GRE verbal 1
GRE
hypocrisy, wizened, arcane, nascent, trifling, malaise, quibble, derogatory, inept, recant, splenetic, insouciance and 21 more...
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Week 1, Day 1
ignominy, marquee, deter, chariot, stern, perfidy, treacherous, insolent, presumptuous, banish, dubious, livid and 133 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for perfidy.

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