guile

Meaning

Noun

1. (uncountable) Astuteness often marked by a certain sense of cunning or artful deception.
2. (countable, uncountable) Deceptiveness, deceit, fraud, duplicity, dishonesty.

Verb

To deceive, beguile, bewile.

Synonyms

deceit

cunning

craft

trickery

fraud

craftiness

slyness

deception

wile

dissimulation

cheating

wiliness

duplicity

artifice

foxiness

chicanery

deceitfulness

trick

delusion

shenanigan

hypocrisy

chicane

beguilement

falsehood

fallacy

resourcefulness

perfidy

sham

shrewdness

spoof

swindle

swindling

tergiversation

treacherousness

treachery

trickiness

wiles

humbuggery

shame

clever deceit

trickishness

jiggery pokery

bilk

charlatanry

cheat

circumvention

cleverness

crookedness

cunningness

disguise

Translations

ruse

astucia

astuzia

List

fourberie

astúcia

πονηριά

astuce

inganno

δόλος

falsità

imbroglio

furberia

tromperie

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ɡaɪl/

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English: gile

In summary

From Middle English gile, from Anglo-Norman gile, from Old French guile (“deception”), from Frankish *wīl (“ruse”), from Proto-Germanic *wīlą, from Proto-Indo-European *wey- (“to turn, bend”). Cognate via Proto-Germanic with wile.