Devious

Definition: Devious

Devious

Adjective

1. Indirect in departing from the accepted or proper way; misleading; "used devious means to achieve success"; "gave oblique answers to direct questions"; "oblique political maneuvers".

2. Characterized by insincerity or deceit; evasive; "a devious character"; "shifty eyes".

3. Deviating from a straight course; "a scenic but devious route"; "a long and circuitous journey by train and boat"; "a roundabout route avoided rush-hour traffic".

Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
 

Date "devious" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1374. (references)

Etymology: Devious \De"vi*ous\, adjective. [Latin expression devius; de via way. See Viaduct.]. (references)

Synonyms: Devious

Curvature

Adjective: curved; Verb: curviform, curvilineal, curvilinear; devex, devious; recurved, recurvous; crump; bowed; Verb: vaulted, hooked; falciform, falcated; semicircular, crescentic; sinusoid, parabolic, paraboloid; luniform, lunular; semilunar, conchoidal; helical, double helical, spiral; kinky; cordiform, cordated; cardioid; heart shaped, bell shaped, boat shaped, crescent shaped, lens shaped, moon shaped, oar shaped, shield shaped, sickle shaped, tongue shaped, pear shaped, fig shaped; kidney-shaped, reniform; lentiform, lenticular; bow-legged; (distorted); oblique; circular.

Deviation

Adjective: deviating; Verb: aberrant, errant; excursive, discursive; devious, desultory, loose; rambling; stray, erratic, vagrant, undirected, circuitous, indirect, zigzag; crab-like.

Crosswords: Devious

For a fossilized High Guard Officer, your Dylan Hunt is one devious human being (Andromeda; writing credit: John Cranna)

Who's that casting devious stares (Sex and Candy; performing artist: Marcy Playground)

To help them make it through all of the devious things that people do (Friends And Family; performing artist: Trik Turner)

Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

Books

• A Devious Dictionary (reference)

• Devious Derivations: Popular Misconceptions-And More Than 1,000 True Origins of Common Words and Phrases (reference)

• Devious Mind-Bending Puzzles (reference)

• Devious Murder (reference)

• Diesel's Devious Deed: And Other Thomas the Tank Engine Stories (Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends Book and Cassette Series) (reference)

  (more book examples)

Theater & Movies

• Devious Beings (reference)

• Dr. Devious more Dance in Cyberspace (reference)

  (more DVD examples; more video examples)

Music

• Devious (reference)

• Devious Methods (reference)

  (more classical music examples; more popular music examples)

Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

Expressions using "devious": a devious step ♦ by devious means ♦ devious step ♦ get smth. by devious means ♦ get smth. devious means. Additional references.

Albanian

dredha-dredha (anfractuous, curly, sinuous, tortuous, winding), dinak (argute, artful, canny, crafty, cunning, daedalian, furtive, leery, pawky, sleeky, sly, wily), devijues (diverting), i tërthortë (constructive, indirect, oblique, roundabout, tortuous, transversal), i pasinqertë (disingenuous, hypocritical, insincere, left handed, phoney, phony, tortuous), i pandershëm (base, conscienceless, dark, dirty, dishonest, disreputable, ill gotten, knavish, mean, rascally, raw, roguish, unfaithful, unscrupulous, unsportsmanlike), i larguar (evacuee, gone, runaway, wide), gjarpërues (serpentine, sinuous, snaky, tortuous, twisting, wandering, winding). (various references)

Arabic 

‏منحرف (askew, aslant, awry, bent, deflector, depraved, errant, inclined, oblique, perverse, skew, slant, slanted, slanting, tilted), ‏مواربة (equivocation, prevarication, quibble, tergiversation), ‏مخادع (artful, bluff, bluffer, crafty, deceitful, deceptive, delusive, dishonest, disingenuous, double, double dealing, double-tongued, face, false, fraudulent, hustler, illusive, illusory, indirect, insincere, misguiding, misleading, sly, trickish, tricky, underhand, wily), ‏مراوغ (deceitful, dodgy, elusive, evasive, shifting, shifty, wily), ‏ناء (outlying, remote), ‏تائه (errant, stray, vagrant, wandering). (various references)

Bulgarian 

отклоняващ се (divergent, excursive, tangential, variant), нечестен (cammed, crooked, dishonest, dishonorable, dishonourable, dodgy, faithless, false, ignominious, low down, screwy, twisty, unfair, wildcat), заобиколен (circumlocutory, indirect, round, roundabout). (various references)

Chinese 

迂回 (Circuitous). (various references)

Czech

vychytralý (artful, astute, designing, shrewd, shrewish, sly, wily), prohnaný (arrant, cannie, canny, cunning, dodgy, foxy), pochybný (disreputable, dodgy, doubtful, dubious, equivocal, murky, problematical, questionable, seamy, seedy, shady, specious, suspect, unsavory), odchylný (divergent, variant), mylný (erring, erroneous, faulty, mistaken, wrong), klikatý (snaky, tortuous, winding, zigzag), křivolaký (oblique, tortuous). (various references)

Farsi 

منحرف (Aberrant, Amiss, Astray, Awry, Deviant, Hellbent, Lost, Oblique, Perverse, Pervert, Skew), کج (Askance, Askew, Awry, Crank, Crump, Gauche, Indirect, Lopsided, Sidelong, Sinister, Slant, Snafu, Thwart, Wry), گمراه (Aberrant, Amiss, Astray, Heterodox, Perverse), غیرمستقیم (Indirect, Oblique, Sideway, Sinuous, Tortuous), بی راهه . (various references)

French

détourné, tortueux, sournois. (various references)

German

abwegig (deviously, eccentric, erroneous, groundless, off beat, perverse, perversely, wayward). (various references)

Greek 

ύπουλος (furtive, insidious, sly, underhanded), περιστροφικόσ (circuitous, circular, gyral, gyratory, rotary, rotational, rotative, rotatory, turning), πλάγιοσ (aslant, bevel, circuitous, indirect, lateral, oblique, side, sidelong, slanting), παραπλανητικόσ, εκτρεπόμενοσ (aberrant, swerver), λοξόσ (askew, awry, cockeyed, crackpot, kinky, oblique, rakish, sidelong, skew, slant, slanting, transverse, wry), δόλιος (deceitful, insidious, underhanded). (various references)

Hebrew 

עקלקל (crooked, curved, meander, tortuous), ערמומי (arch, artful, calculating, canny, catchy, crafty, cunning, foxy, insidious, pawky, shifty, slicker, sly, underhand, wily), �"ולך סחור סחור. (various references)

Hungarian

fondorlatos (fraudulent, guileful, malicious, shrewd, tainted with fraud). (various references)

Indonesian

berliku-liku (tortuous, winding, zigzag). (various references)

Italian

tortuoso (circuitous, roundabout, tortuous, wandering, winding), obliquo (askance, askew, cross, indirect, lopsided, oblique, sidelong, sideward, slanting, sloped, sloping, slopingly, transversal, underhand, wry), indiretto (circuitous, indirect, oblique, roundabout, vicarious), errato (false, perverse), ambiguo (ambidexter, ambiguous, backhanded, doubtful, equivocal). (various references)

Japanese Kanji 

迂� (roundabout). (various references)

Japanese Katakana 

うえ�" (right margin, roundabout). (various references)

Manx

shaghrynagh (abberant, absent, bewildering, disjointed, drifter, errant, misleading, stray, strayer, truant, wandering), rouaillagh (adrift, delirious, erring, incoherent, itinerant, prowler, rambling), croutagh (calculating, crafty, scheming, subtle). (various references)

Norwegian

underfundig. (various references)

Pig Latin

eviousday.(various references)

Portuguese

divergente (dissonant, divergent), desviado (diverting, roundabout), desonesto (cambered, crooked, dishonest, drossy, false, immodest, impure, knavish, light-fingered, low-down, nasty, shady, sharp, shifty, thievish, tortuous, unchaste, unfair, unfaithful, untrustworthy), desleal (cammed, dishonest, disloyal, faithless, false, hollow-hearted, recreant, shifty, traitorous, treacherous, treasonable, trustless, truthless, unfair, unfaithful, untrustworthy), tortuoso (anfractuous, bent, crooked, curved, serpentine, sinuous, snaky, tortuous, torturous, winding), perdido (absent, absentee, forfeit, forlorn, graceless, helpless, ill-favored, ill-favoured, lost, missing, out-of-the-way, perdu, strayed, undone, waste), errante (arrant, errant, erring, excursive, gadabout, knockabout, migratory, nomad, planetary, rambling, strolling, viatic, wandering), afastado (aloof, away, distant, ex-service, far-off, off, offscreen, outlandish, outlying, out-of-the-way, remote, removed, retired, secluded, secret, straggling, unfrequented, withdrawn). (various references)

Romanian

ocolit (circuitous, round about, roundabout), nesincer (backhand, disingenuous, double faced, hollow-hearted, insincere, insincerely, pecksniffian, tortuous, truthless), care nu e drept, întortocheat (crooked, serpentine, sinuous, tortuous, winding). (various references)

Russian 

увертливый, окольный (circuitous, indirect, oblique, roundabout), неискренний (affected, canting, diplomatic, disingenuous, fulsome, hollow, hollow-hearted, insincere, lip, lip-deep, mealymouthed, mealy-mouthed, tongue in cheek, tortuous), извилистый (anfractuous, convoluted, cranky, sinuate, sinuous, snaky, tortuous, winding). (various references)

Serbo-Croatian

zaobilazan (indirect, oblique, roundabout), nepošten (crooked, dishonest, immoral, knavish, underhand, underhanded, unprincipled, unscrupulous), neiskren (affected, disingenuous, double-tongued, fulsome, hollow-hearted, insincere, left handed, lip-deep, oblique). (various references)

Spanish

desviado (aberrated, awry, deflected, detour, deviant, remote, turned), tortuoso (anfractuous, circuitous, discombobulated, snaky, tortuous, winding), taimado (deep, sly, slyboots), sinuoso (serpentine, sinuous, slinky, wandering), intrincado (intricate, tricky), astuto (artful, astute, cannie, canny, clever, colic, crafty, cunning, deep, dodgy, foxy, guileful, insidious, knowing, leery, malicious, mischievous, nasty, pawky, politic, sharp, shifty, sleeky, slick, sly, smart, tricky, vicious, wide, wily, worldly wise). (various references)

Swedish

slingrande (flexuose, flexuous, serpentine, sinuous, tortuous, wiggly, winding), irrande (erratic, excursive). (various references)

Turkish

dolambaçlı (circuitous, circular, indirect, labyrinthine, oblique, roundabout, serpentine, shuffling, sinuous, tortuous, winding), dürüst olamayan, sapa (off, off the beaten track, out of the way, remote), aldatıcı (baffling, beguiling, catchy, colorable, colored, coloured, deceptive, delusive, dishonest, double dealing, elusory, fake, fallacious, googly, hype, illusive, illusory, indirect, specious, treacherous, trickish, tricksy, tricky). (various references)

Ukrainian

хитрий (arch, argute, artful, astute, canny, cattish, crafty, cunning, doleful, enterprising, foxy, hard-headed, leery, pawky, shifting, shrewd, sly, tricky, wide, wily), обхідний (circuitous, circular, oblique, roundabout, wormy), непрямий (implied, indirect, oblique, sideway, sideways, sidewise, vicarious), заблуканий, заблудний (erring, wandered). (various references)

Vietnamese 

xa xôi (far-off, out-of-the-way, remote), vòng vèo, ranh ma lầm đường lạc lối, loanh quanh; thủ đoạn, láu cá (crafty, cunning, dodgy, foxlike, leery, tricksy, tricky), khúc khuỷu không ngay thẳng, không th� nh thật (backhanded, disingenuous, double, double-faced, hollow-hearted), hẻo lánh quanh co. (various references)

devius. (various references)

Derivations

Words beginning with "devious": deviously, deviousness, deviousnesses. (additional references)

Misspellings

"Devious" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: davyum, Debieux, dedimus, deeioo, deivence, Deivio, derious, Desvaux, devience, deviouis, deviour, devoids, devoits, Diviacus, duvious, dvious, edious, evious, Mevius. (additional references)

Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits.

Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams

-1 letter: videos.

-2 letters: dives, douse, doves, eidos, video, vised, voids.

-3 letters: devs, dies, dive, does, dose, dove, dues, duos, ides, odes, ouds, side, sued, udos, used, vide, vied, vies, vise, voes, void.

-4 letters: dev, die, dis, doe, dos, due, dui, duo, eds, ids, ode, ods, oes, ose, oud, sei, sod, sou, sue, udo, use, vie.

+2 letters: deviously, outdrives.

+3 letters: adenovirus, overbuilds, overissued.

+4 letters: declivitous, deviousness, devolutions, outdelivers, overinsured, oversudsing, undissolved, zidovudines.

+5 letters: adenoviruses, adventitious, devaluations, overdiscount, overindulges, oversupplied, subvocalized, undiscovered.