devilment

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. Devilish action or conduct; wickedness; (more generally) troublemaking behaviour; mischief; (countable) an instance of this.
  2. A devilish, mischievous, or reckless nature; mischievousness.
  3. Something cruel or evil; also, something which causes distress or suffering.
  4. Something cleverly constructed.
  5. A dish which is devilled (“made piquant or spicy”); a devil; also, the elements of the dish which make it spicy, or the piquancy or spiciness of the dish.

Pronunciation

/ˈdɛv(ɪ)lm(ə)nt/ LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-devilment.wav /ˈdɛv(ə)lm(ə)nt/

Word forms

devilment devilments

Etymology

From devil + -ment (suffix forming nouns indicating the actions or results of what is denoted by the words it is attached to).

Synonyms

This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.