chicanery
(ʃɪˈkeɪnərɪ)
Forms: 7 chiquanerey, -ery, chicanrey, chicannery, 7–8 chicanry, 7– chicanery.
[a. F. chicanerie, in Littré the earliest exemplified member of the group, implying however the existence of the vb. chicaner and n. chicaneur as its source: see -ery. Formerly more completely anglicized as ˈchicanry.]
1. Legal trickery, pettifogging, abuse of legal forms; the use of subterfuge and trickery in debate or action; quibbling, sophistry, trickery.
| a 1613 Overbury Observ. State France (1856) 241 All this chiquanerey, as they call it, is brought into France from Rome. 1665 Evelyn Lett. Sir P. Wyche 20 June, We have hardly any words that do so fully expresse the French clinquant, naiveté..chicaneries. a 1670 Hacket Abp. Williams ii. (1692) 151, I shall not advise this honourable House to use any chiquanery or pettiffoggery with this great representation of the kingdom. 1682 Burnet Rights Princes Pref. 57 To do it with all the Tricks and Chicanery possible. 1704 J. Harris Lex. Techn., Chicanry, is a trickish and guileful Practice of the Law. 1708 Ozell Boileau's Lutrin v. (1730) 53 That foul Monster, void of Ears and Eyes, Call'd Chicanry. 1754 Richardson Grandison (1781) IV. ii. 14 It was..by the chicanery of the lawyers..carried against him. 1827 Hallam Const. Hist. II. xii. The period of lord Danby's administration..was full of chicanery and dissimulation on the King's side. 1876 Green Short Hist. viii. §8. Forty days wasted in useless chicanery. |
b. as a personal quality.
| 1771 Smollett Humph. Cl. let. 26 June, He carried home with him all the knavish chicanery of the lowest pettifogger. 1832 Lander Adv. Niger III. xvi. 256 The artifice, chicanery and low cunning of a crafty and corrupt mind. |
2. (with pl.) A dishonest artifice of law; a sophistry, quibble, subterfuge, trick.
| 1688 Answ. Talon's Plea 23 Pitifull Chicanneries and tricks of the Law. 1758 Jortin Erasm. I. 103 These letters..full of chicaneries about trifles. 1878 R. B. Smith Carthage 227 Impatient of such chicaneries. |