different between sly vs deceptive

English

Alternative forms

• sligh (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English sly, sley, sleigh, slei?, from Old Norse slægr, slœgr (“sly, cunning”, literally “capable of hitting or striking”), from Proto-Germanic *sl?giz (“lively, agile, cunning, sly, striking”), from Proto-Indo-European *slak- (“to hit, throw”). Cognate with Icelandic slægur (“crafty, sly”), Norwegian Nynorsk sløg (“sly”), Swedish slug (“sly”). Related to sleight, slay. In all likelihood, however, unrelated with Saterland Frisian slau (“sly, crafty”), Dutch sluw (“sly, cunning”), Low German slu (“sly, cunning”), German schlau (“clever, crafty”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sla?/
• Rhymes: -a?

Adjective

sly (comparative slier or slyer, superlative sliest or slyest)

1. Artfully cunning; secretly mischievous; wily.
2. (having a positive sense) Dexterous in performing an action, so as to escape notice

   Synonyms: nimble, skillful, cautious, shrewd

3. Done with, and marked by, artful and dexterous secrecy; subtle

4. Light or delicate; slight; thin.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:wily

Derived terms

Translations

Further reading

• sly in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• sly in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Adverb

sly

1. Slyly.

Anagrams

• Lys, YLS, YLs, lys, syl-

Lower Sorbian

Adjective

sly

1. Obsolete spelling of z?y (“bad, evil”)

Middle English

Alternative forms

• scle, slei, sley, scley, slegh, sleigh, sleygh, sligh, slygh, sle?, slei?, slei?h, sli?, sly?, scli?, sly?h, sleyh, slih, slyh

Etymology

From Old Norse slœgr, from Proto-Germanic *sl?giz.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sli?/, /sl?i?/, /slix/, /sl?i?x/

Adjective

sly (plural and weak singular slye, comparative slyer, superlative sliest)

1. Judicious, considered, shrewd; having or indicative of great wisdom.
2. Adept, expert, quality; having or indicative of great expertise.
3. Sly, artful, wily; employing or being an example of deception.
4. (rare) Attractive; having good looks.
5. (rare) Unknown or hidden.

Related terms

• sleighly
• sleight
• slynesse

Descendants

• English: sly
• Scots: slee

References

• “sleigh, adj.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2019-06-05.

Swedish

Noun

sly n

1. very young trees, in particular while growing very densely

Declension

Anagrams

• lys, syl, yls

English

Etymology

From Middle French déceptif, from Latin d?cept?vus, from d?cipi? (“I deceive”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /d?.?s?p.t?v/

Adjective

deceptive (comparative more deceptive, superlative most deceptive)

1. Likely or attempting to deceive.

   Synonym: misleading

   • 1653, John Bulwer, Anthropometamorphosis, London: William Hunt, Scene 24, p. 521,^[1]

     […] others declare that no Creature can be made or transmuted into a better or worse, or transformed into another species […] and Martinus Delrio the Jesuit accounts this degeneration of Man into a Beast to be an illusion, deceptive and repugnant to Nature;

   • 1789, Thomas Holcroft (translator), The History of My Own Times by Frederick the Great, London: G.G.J. and J. Robinson, Part 1, Chapter 12, p. 163,^[2]

     […] at the opening of the campaign, the French, after various deceptive attempts on different places, suddenly invested Tournay.

   • 1846, Richard Chenevix Trench, Notes on the Miracles of Our Lord, London: John W. Parker, 2nd ed., 1847, Preliminary Essay, Chapter 2, p. 10,^[3]

     language altogether deceptive, and hiding the deeper reality from our eyes

   • 1978, Susan Sontag, Illness as Metaphor, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Chapter 2, p. 13,^[4]

     […] it is characteristic of TB that many of its symptoms are deceptive—liveliness that comes from enervation, rosy cheeks that look like a sign of health but come from fever—and an upsurge of vitality may be a sign of approaching death.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:deceptive

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations