Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To cheat or defraud of money or property.
- v. To obtain by fraudulent means: swindled money from the company.
- v. To practice fraud as a means of obtaining money or property.
- n. The act or an instance of swindling.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To cheat or defraud. The word implies, commonly, recourse to petty and mean artifices for obtaining money which may or may not be strictly illegal.
- n. The act or process of swindling; a fraudulent scheme; an act of cheating; an imposition; a fraud.
- n. Anything that is deceptive or not what it is said or thought to be.
Wiktionary
- v. transitive to defraud (someone)
- v. intransitive to obtain money or property by fraudulent or deceitful methods
- n. an instance of swindling
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To cheat defraud grossly, or with deliberate artifice.
- n. The act or process of swindling; a cheat.
WordNet 3.0
- n. the act of swindling by some fraudulent scheme
- v. deprive of by deceit
Etymologies
- Middle High German, from Old High German swintiln, frequentative of the verb swintan, compare Modern German schwindeln. (Wiktionary)
- Back-formation from swindler, one who swindles, from German Schwindler, giddy person, cheat, from schwindeln, to be dizzy, swindle, from Middle High German, from Old High German swintilōn, frequentative of swintan, to disappear. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The swindle is the implicit assumption this will raise the overall correlation between compensation and quality from approximately zero to approximately one.”
David Cutler on Health Care, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
“This plan was a swindle from the very start, and every body in the Congress and Pentagon knew it.”
“He leveled his gaze at me and said, "Hey, hey, hey," long dramatic pause, "swindle is an awfully harsh word.”
“If you look up a grift in the dictionary, its defined as a swindle - a confidence game.”
“I seriously doubt it … it’s not to your benefit to do so in this case. bobby swindle is soooooooo last year’s news …. after the shining start of the repugnantscum party crashed, burned and fell to the earth after that atrocious rebuttal to obama’s speech.”
“Instead, the way that they accomplished the swindle is explained in this post.]”
The Budget Debate, VI, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
“Bozo The Neoclown says: bobby swindle is soooooooo last year’s news …. after the shining start of the repugnantscum party crashed, burned and fell to the earth after that atrocious rebuttal to obama’s speech.”
“Eckoh claimed the swindle was already in place when they took over the contract in 2004.”
“The GOP candidate who compared the popular retirement program to what the dictionary defines as a swindle?”
“The swindle is another blow to Queensland Health, which is still reeling from the payroll bungle of 18 months ago.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘swindle’.
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LIT - Ulysses - key words and phrases
money cowrie, bedraggle, omphalos, ineluctable, postprandial, bladderwrack, modality barnacle..., loofah, shipworm, cither, embattle, Malachi and 503 more...
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WF - list of EN back-formations
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_back-formations
aborigine, accrete, acculturate, admix, admixture, adolesce, adsorb, adulate, advect, aesthete, air-condition, anticline and 212 more...
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SCIE - statistics
a priori probability, Abbe-Helmert crit..., absolute error, absolutely unbias..., accuracy, ACF, affinity, AIC, algorithm, allometry, alphabet, anomic and 4171 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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Thievery
synonymous with steal.
pinch, lift, pilfer, appropriate, bilk, abscond, burgle, usurp, purloin, shoplift, bite, five finger discount and 38 more...
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Lying, cheating, and stealing
subterfuge, chicanery, skulduggery, pilfer, purloin, bamboozle, bilk, gyp, hoodwink, swindle, hoax, dupe and 28 more...
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essbunny@gmail.com's list
Intrigued by these words...
sphincter, blush, flume, shingle, spurt, pulp, precious, squeal, zest, zeal, cherish, fervor and 35 more...
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Thief Words
Words that deal with stealing and thievery!
steal, plunder, theif, robber, rob, take, kidnap, stole, take ownership, snatch, grab, hide and 19 more...
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the first list
an immense, grandiloquent list that loads like a thousand years sentence in stone. new words are in the other lists.
ridiculous, brummagem, predicament, sanctimonious, vapid, eschew, admonish, auspicious, capitulation, enumerate, lachrymose, tenet and 1648 more...
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What Do You Mean ?
U Gotta Know These.......
falter, ruddy, flounder, pallid, fumble, founder, labile, titular, tacit, pragmatic, fatalism, jaded and 112 more...
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Baby Got Back-Formations
"A new word created by removing an affix from an already existing word, as vacuum clean from vacuum cleaner, or by removing what is mistakenly thought to be an affix, as pea from the earlier Englis...
resurrect, enthuse, couth, donate, emote, greed, isolate, manipulate, orate, prequel, spectate, upholster and 94 more...
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Good for Academics
Gahh!! Study!
supplant, usurp, finagle, winnow, draconian, abut, collude, swindle, objectify, incite, decadent, obstinate and 327 more...
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kalidas's Words
crepuscular, mellifluous, ephemeral, diaphanous, zeitgeist, geisterfahrer, infinite, eternal, idyllic, azure, reminiscent, oblivion and 521 more...
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The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
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slumry's Words
cattywampus, ingratiate, lackadaisical, exactitude, exfoliate, fulminate, circumnavigation, circuitous, debride, sidle, sequester, chicory and 1002 more...
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katiefallwest's Words
facetious, hallows, snarky, literati, cantankerous, gryphon, esoteric, fortuitous, impetus, ubiquitous, muggle, colour and 144 more...
Tweets
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