deceit

• deceipt (obsolete)

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

• IPA^(key): /dɪˈsiːt/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iːt

deceit (plural deceits)

1. An act or practice intended to deceive; a trick.

   The whole conversation was merely a deceit.

2. An act of deceiving someone.
   • 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.
   • 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.

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 10:7:

     His mouth is full of curſing, and deceit, and fraud : vnder his tongue is miſchiefe and vanitie.

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): trick, fraud
• (act of deceiving): deception, trickery
• (state of being deceptive): underhandedness, deceptiveness, deceitfulness, dissimulation, fraudulence, trickery
• See also Thesaurus:deception