cheat

—cheatable, adj. —cheatingly, adv.

/cheet/, v.t.

1. to defraud; swindle: He cheated her out of her inheritance.

2. to deceive; influence by fraud: He cheated us into believing him a hero.

3. to elude; deprive of something expected: He cheated the law by suicide.

v.i.

4. to practice fraud or deceit: She cheats without regrets.

5. to violate rules or regulations: He cheats at cards.

6. to take an examination or test in a dishonest way, as by improper access to answers.

7. Informal. to be sexually unfaithful (often fol. by on): Her husband knew she had been cheating all along. He cheated on his wife.

n.

8. a person who acts dishonestly, deceives, or defrauds: He is a cheat and a liar.

9. a fraud; swindle; deception: The game was a cheat.

10. Law. the fraudulent obtaining of another's property by a pretense or trick.

11. an impostor: The man who passed as an earl was a cheat.

[1325-75; ME chet (n.) (aph. for achet, var. of eschet ESCHEAT); cheten to escheat, deriv. of chet (n.)]

Syn. 1. mislead, dupe, delude; gull, con; hoax, fool. CHEAT, DECEIVE, TRICK, VICTIMIZE refer to the use of fraud or artifice deliberately to hoodwink or obtain an unfair advantage over someone. CHEAT implies conducting matters fraudulently, esp. for profit to oneself: to cheat at cards. DECEIVE suggests deliberately misleading or deluding, to produce misunderstanding or to prevent someone from knowing the truth: to deceive one's parents.

To TRICK is to deceive by a stratagem, often of a petty, crafty, or dishonorable kind: to trick someone into signing a note. To VICTIMIZE is to make a victim of; the emotional connotation makes the cheating, deception, or trickery seem particularly dastardly: to victimize a blind man. 8. swindler, trickster, sharper, dodger, charlatan, fraud, fake, phony, mountebank. 9. imposture, artifice, trick, hoax.

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