Word of the Week (WOW) – Duplicity

Word of the Week (WOW) is a weekly meme created by Heena Rathore P. It’s a fun way to improve vocabulary by learning new words every week.

To participate, simply do a post with your word and leave the link to as a comment on Heena’s WOW post.

Here is my WOW for this week:

Word: Duplicity

Part of Speech:  Noun

Adjective: duplicitous

Plural: duplicities

Nearby Words:

duplicate, duplicating, duplication, duplicator,duplicature, duplicatus

 Pronunciation:

UK: due-plic-i-tee (dyu-plic-i-tee)

US: du-plic-i-ty (doo-plic-i-tee)

 Meaning:

1. Deliberate deceptiveness in behaviour or speech (especially by saying different things to two people).

2. An instance of deliberate deceptiveness; double dealing

3. The quality or state of being twofold or double

Synonyms:  

cunning, deceit, deceitfulness, deception, double-dealing, guile, shiftiness, dissimulation, fraud, hypocrisy

Antonyms:

candidness, directness, honesty, straightforwardness

Word Origin:  

1400-50 Late Middle English fron the Middle French duplicite. The roots of the word can be found in the Late Latin word, duplicatas and duplex.  The most common sense of duplicity today is deceitfulness. The roots of this meaning can be found in the initial  ‘dupl’ – from the Latin duplex, meaning twofold, or double.

Use in a sentence: 

1. Martha was not a woman for compromise or duplicity.

2. The salesman was not averse to a little duplicity in his dealings with customers.

*

I particularly like the adjective of this word: duplicitous. I have a few duplicitous characters in my books. I also use the word perfidious, which can also be a synonym of duplicitous (but has other meanings as well, including unfaithful and treasonous). To me, both duplicitous and perfidious sound so much more interesting than just saying deceitful.

 *

If you would like to check out more interesting words then visit Heena’s page:

Word Treasure