| / English Dictionary |
THIEF
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
Irregular inflected form: thieves
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A criminal who takes property belonging to someone else with the intention of keeping it or selling it
Synonyms:
stealer; thief
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("thief" is a kind of...):
criminal; crook; felon; malefactor; outlaw (someone who has committed a crime or has been legally convicted of a crime)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "thief"):
pilferer; sneak thief; snitcher (a thief who steals without using violence)
snatcher (a thief who grabs and runs)
cracksman; safebreaker; safecracker (a thief who breaks open safes to steal valuable contents)
cattle thief; rustler (someone who steals livestock (especially cattle))
robber (a thief who steals from someone by threatening violence)
despoiler; freebooter; looter; pillager; plunderer; raider; spoiler (someone who takes spoils or plunder (as in war))
literary pirate; pirate; plagiariser; plagiarist; plagiarizer (someone who uses another person's words or ideas as if they were his own)
cutpurse; dip; pickpocket (a thief who steals from the pockets or purses of others in public places)
larcener; larcenist (a person who commits larceny)
holdup man; stickup man (an armed thief)
graverobber (someone who steals valuables from graves or crypts)
body snatcher; ghoul; graverobber (someone who takes bodies from graves and sells them for anatomical dissection)
defalcator; embezzler; peculator (someone who violates a trust by taking (money) for his own use)
dacoit; dakoit (a member of an armed gang of robbers)
burglar (a thief who enters a building with intent to steal)
booster; lifter; shoplifter (a thief who steals goods that are in a store)
bandit; brigand (an armed thief who is (usually) a member of a band)
Context examples:
"Sneak-thief!" Martin retorted, slamming the door as he passed out.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
The fiend pinning down the thief's pack behind him, I passed over quickly: it was an object of terror.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
"It's a useful thing to have in the house in case of fire or thieves," observed Laurie, as a watchman's rattle appeared, amid the laughter of the girls.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
Poor blundering thief that he was, always getting caught and punished, he had none the less been a faithful worker.
(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)
It turns me cold to think of this creature stealing like a thief to Harry’s bedside; poor Harry, what a wakening!
(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
She read from the New Testament, and he took keen interest in the prodigal son and the thief on the cross.
(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)
But he was too deep, and too ready, and too clever for me, and by the time the two men had come back out of breath and confessed that they had lost the track in a crowd, and been scolded like thieves, I would have gone bail for the innocence of Long John Silver.
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
They look upon fraud as a greater crime than theft, and therefore seldom fail to punish it with death; for they allege, that care and vigilance, with a very common understanding, may preserve a man’s goods from thieves, but honesty has no defence against superior cunning; and, since it is necessary that there should be a perpetual intercourse of buying and selling, and dealing upon credit, where fraud is permitted and connived at, or has no law to punish it, the honest dealer is always undone, and the knave gets the advantage.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
At last the thieves found him out, and lifted him up in their hands.
(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)
To whom would the thief take it?
(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
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