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27 entries · 34 local imagesthe readable wording below follows the local electronic OED, second edition, DICT transcription; all 34 OED and OED-derived image files already held in david-james are linked here, including full, focused, earlier and site-display crops; each variant is identified in its link text;
An unlawful attack upon the person of another. (In Law a menacing word or action is sufficient to constitute an assault, the term battery being techn. added when an actual blow is inflicted.)
The offence of habitually exciting quarrels, or moving or maintaining law-suits; vexatious persistence in, or incitement to, litigation.
An inhabitant of a city or (often) of a town; esp. one possessing civic rights and privileges, a burgess or freeman of a city.
Of or belonging to citizens; consisting of citizens, or men dwelling together in a community, as in civil society, civil life; also, of the nature of a citizen, as civil man, civil creature. The literal sense `of citizens' is rare (quot. 1848).
Of or pertaining to the whole body or community of citizens; pertaining to the organization and internal affairs of the body politic, or state.
One who makes or has made the Civil Law (chiefly as distinguished originally from the Canon Law, and later from the Common Law) the object of his study: a practitioner, doctor, professor, or student of Civil Law, a writer or authority on the Civil Law. `By civilian is meant in English (1) one who professes and practises the civil law, as opposed to the common, or municipal law of England; (2) one who teaches or expounds this civil law; (3) one who studies it' (De Quincey).
`One who, despising the righteousness of Christ, did yet follow after a certain civil righteousness, a justitia civilis of his own' (Trench). Cf. civil 15b.
The law of Roman citizens; thence, the Roman law as a whole, esp. as received in Western christendom in and after the Middle Ages. In early times, specially distinguished from the canon law, in later times from the common law of England. See law.
The territory or land of a nation; usually an independent state, or a region once independent and still distinct in race, language, institutions, or historical memories, as England, Scotland, and Ireland, in the United Kingdom, etc. With political changes, what were originally distinct countries have become provinces or districts of one country, and vice versa; the modern tendency being to identify the term with the existing political condition.
The action or practice of deceiving; concealment of the truth in order to mislead; deception, fraud, cheating, false dealing.
To wrest or wring (something) from a person; to extract by torture.
To obtain from a reluctant person by violence, torture, intimidation, or abuse of legal or official authority, or (in weaker sense) by importunity, overwhelming arguments, or any powerful influence. Const. of, from, out of, upon.
That which, or something that, is contrary to fact or truth; an untrue proposition, doctrine, belief, etc.; untrue propositions, etc. in general.
In material sense: To fashion, form, shape. Obs. exc. as nonce-use after Lat.
To invent (a story, excuse, accusation); to forge (a document).
The action of “feigning” or inventing imaginary incidents, existences, states of things, etc., whether for the purpose of deception or otherwise. (The reproachful sense [= “fabrication”] is merely contextual.)
That which, or something that, is imaginatively invented; feigned existence, event, or state of things; invention as opposed to fact.
To make, fashion, frame, or construct (any material thing); = fabricate v. 1. Obs. exc. as coincident with transf. use of 2. To forge together: to frame together, weld.
esp. To fabricate, frame, invent (a false or imaginary story, lie, etc.); to devise (evil). Also, to pretend (something) to have happened, to fable.
To make (something) in fraudulent imitation of something else; to make or devise (something spurious) in order to pass it off as genuine.
Criminal deception; the using of false representations to obtain an unjust advantage or to injure the rights or interests of another.
The governing power in a state; the body of persons charged with the duty of governing. This may be viewed in two aspects, giving rise to two distinct senses of the word, which however often coincide in use.
As a permanent entity (cf. “the Crown”, “Parliament”, etc.), irrespective of the changes in the persons who hold office. Hence often practically equivalent to state, esp. when used attrib.
To trouble or vex by repeated attacks.
To trouble, worry, distress with annoying labour, care, perplexity, importunity, misfortune, etc.
To make identical (with, to something) in thought or in reality; to consider, regard, or treat as the same.
The quality or condition of being the same in substance, composition, nature, properties, or in particular qualities under consideration; absolute or essential sameness; oneness.
The action of devising, contriving, or making up; contrivance, fabrication.
A fictitious statement or story; a fabrication, fiction, figment.
To be or stand as an emblem or representative of; to stand for, represent, symbolize, typify, signify; to represent vicariously or officially, stand in the place of; to embody in a personal form, impersonate. Now rare or Obs.
= next.
A rhetorical figure by which an imaginary or absent person is represented as speaking or acting; the introduction of a pretended speaker.
To bring clearly and distinctly before the mind, esp. (to another) by description or (to oneself) by an act of imagination.
To exhibit or personate (a character) on the stage; to act the part or character of (some one).
[L. jūs cīvīle.]
The law of Roman citizens; thence, the Roman law as a whole, esp. as received in Western christendom in and after the Middle Ages. In early times, specially distinguished from the canon law, in later times from the common law of England. See law.
the state: the body politic as organized for supreme civil rule and government; the political organization which is the basis of civil government (either generally and abstractly, or in a particular country); hence, the supreme civil power and government vested in a country or nation.
of one’s own right.
Anc. Roman Law. Of the status of one who was not subject to the patria potestas.
Mod. Law. Of full age and capacity, legally competent to manage one’s own affairs.
transf. One’s own master.
Suppression of truth or fact for the purpose of obtaining something, or the action of obtaining something in this way (cf. subreption 1); more generally, fraudulent misrepresentation, or other underhand or stealthy proceeding. Obs.