chicanery

English

WOTD – 3 June 2008

Etymology

From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] French chicanerie (“trickery”), from chicaner.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ʃɪˈkeɪn(ə)ɹi/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Noun

chicanery (countable and uncountable, plural chicaneries)

1. Deception by use of trickery, quibbling, or subterfuge.
   • 2019 April 28, Alex McLevy, “Game Of Thrones suffers the fog of war in the battle against the dead (newbies)”, in The A.V. Club‎^[1]:

     Having survived “The Long Night,” Daenerys will now be turning her attention back to the problem that originally vexed her: Cersei Lannister. It will be interesting to see how the show tries to raise the stakes of an internecine squabble between competing monarchs when compared to an existential threat to humanity’s very existence, but this series has always excelled when it goes deep on the machinations of political chicanery.

   • 1823, Charles Lamb, “Popular Fallacies”, in Elia, new edition, London: Edward Moxon, published 1835, →ISBN, page 241:

     They do not always find manors, got by rapine or chicanery, insensibly to melt away, as the poets will have it ; or that all gold glides, like thawing snow, from the thief’s hand that grasps it.

2. (countable, law) A slick performance by a lawyer.

Synonyms

• (deception): dishonesty, fraud, trickery, subterfuge

Related terms

• chicane

Translations

deception by use of trickery

• Czech: podvod (cs) m, podvrh m
• Dutch: drogreden (nl), chikane, sofisme (nl)
• Finnish: petos (fi), petkutus (fi), epärehellisyys (fi)
• Georgian: ხრიკიანობა (xriḳianoba), თაღლითობა (taɣlitoba)
• German: Täuschung (de) f Schikane (de) f, Täuschungsmanöver n
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Irish: aisiléireacht f
• Polish: krętactwo n, matactwo (pl) n
• Russian: уло́вка (ru) f (ulóvka)
• Serbo-Croatian: prevara (sh) f

A slick performance by a lawyer

• Dutch: vals argument
• Finnish: šikaani (fi)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Portuguese: chicana (pt) f
• Russian: крючкотворство (ru) n (krjučkotvorstvo)

See also

• (performance by a lawyer): Philadelphia lawyer

Further reading

• Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “chicanery”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.