Crossword clues for tergiversation
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Tergiversation \Ter`gi*ver*sa"tion\, n. [L. tergiversario: cf. F. tergiversation.]
-
The act of tergiversating; a shifting; shift; subterfuge; evasion.
Writing is to be preferred before verbal conferences, as being freer from passions and tergiversations.
--Abp. Bramhall. -
Fickleness of conduct; inconstancy; change.
The colonel, after all his tergiversations, lost his life in the king's service.
--Clarendon.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
turning dishonestly from a straightforward action or statement; shifting, shuffling, equivocation, 1560s, from Latin tergiversationem (nominative tergiversatio) "a shifting, evasion, declining, refusing," from past participle stem of tergiversari "turn one's back on, evade," from tergum "the back" (of unknown origin) + versare "to spin, turn" (see versus).
Wiktionary
n. 1 The act of abandoning something or someone, of changing sides; desertion; betrayal. 2 The act of evading any clear course of action or speech, of being deliberately ambiguous; equivocation; fickleness.
WordNet
n. falsification by means of vague or ambiguous language [syn: equivocation]
the act of abandoning a party or cause [syn: apostasy]
Wikipedia
<!-- This long comment was added to the page to prevent it being listed on Special:Shortpages. It and the accompanying monitoring template were generated via Template:Longcomment. Please do not remove the monitor template without removing the comment as well.
Usage examples of "tergiversation".
New England with whom his dishonest tergiversation remains a traditional belief.
Weary of this uncertainty, and the tergiversation of Austria, which was still under the influence of England, and feeling that the prolongation of such a state of things could only turn to his disadvantage, Bonaparte broke the armistice.
Order having been apprised of the possible tergiversation of one of our number by a Master of the Knights Hospitaler of Saint John, Jerusalem, our Senior Abbot has given orders that the monk in question, one Fraire Eleus, is to be questioned.
With his limited experience, Stephen could not say that it was wrong: everybody seemed brisk and cheerful and when a manoeuvre was decided upon it was carried out promptly: but he had supposed this loquacity and tergiversation to be confined to the navy of the French, that lively, articulate nation.
I regret should any large proportion of those members who have been sent to Parliament to represent them in this House, prove to be the men to bring lasting dishonour upon themselves, their constituencies, and this House, by an act of tergiversation so gross as to be altogether unprecedented in the annals of any reformed or unreformed House of Commons.
I whispered, mentally crossing myself as the tergiversation passed my lips.
Lord Chancellor Eldon, and his own sentiments on the Catholic question, he had exhibited the most incredible specimen of monstrous truckling for office, which the whole history of political tergiversation could furnish.
Austrian envoy took, and the shuffling and tergiversation of the ministers of Spain and Holland.
The evidence of one gentleman in particular drew attention: he was accused of tergiversation, and of showing that partial indulgence which his own conduct required.
Prussia then bitterly had to lament the tergiversations which had prevented her from declaring herself against France during the campaign of Austerlitz.
In an execrable left-slanting hand, he announced, employing a sardonic tone that had not been present in his first letters from Lisbon, that the old tubafter a series of delays, reversals, mechanical failures, and governmental tergiversations, had finally been cleared yet againfor departure, on the second of December.
In the newly-awakened feeling of the moment, however, he bitterly upbraided himself for his tergiversations in suffering his thoughts to vacillate between the Star of the Magalloway, who had his plighted faith, and Flower of the Lakes, who had no claims to his special consideration.
And he turned his back towards him, leaving him uncertain whether all the tergiversations of the second lighter had escaped the notice of the first.