TERGIVERSATION • FREE-TRANSLATOR.COM • Definition of Tergiversation

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noun

Tergiversation n.

The act of tergiversating; a shifting; shift; subterfuge; evasion. "Writing is to be preferred before verbal conferences, as being freer from passions and tergiversations."

Fickleness of conduct; inconstancy; change. "The colonel, after all his tergiversations, lost his life in the king's service."

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Etymology of 'Tergiversation'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Tergiversation" Quotes from Famous Books

... to be curious. The heroine, a quadroon, is on the point of matrimonial union with her antagonist, and openly resents the tender advances of her ally. "Call ye this backing of your friends?" Vincent St. George, disgusted at such gross tergiversation, flies entirely away from the point at issue, and applies those remarks to Julie which all disappointed lovers seem to be bound to utter in such cases. Indeed, on the re-appearance of his rival, he challenges him—unblushingly forsaking every branch of the main point, by engaging in a long ...

— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... by, and Mr. Hay did not appear. General Bugeaud, away on the frontier, was losing patience, and wrote me letter after letter, complaining of my tergiversation!" To which I replied, "Well, General, fire off your guns! If you will begin the fighting I'll follow your example at once." But the general turned a deaf ear to that. He answered that pacific overtures which he could not well ignore ...

— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville

... contest in which the Peel administration have chosen to engage with the agricultural interest of England, has added to the mischief. Their unexampled political tergiversation has deprived them of the support of almost all their former adherents; and now, when they see the evil consequences of the vacillating policy which they have pursued with regard to Ireland, and are desirous ...

— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various

... peremptory tripartite brethren arrived at Greenwich, wishing to aggrandize themselves by indulging in exemplary relaxation, indicatory of implacable detestation of integral tergiversation and exoteric intrigue. They fraternized with a phrenological harlequin who was a connoisseur in mezzotint and falconry. The piquant person was heaping contumely and scathing raillery on an amateur in jugular recitative, who held that ...

— 1001 Questions and Answers on Orthography and Reading • B. A. Hathaway

Words linked to "Tergiversation" : desertion, tergiversate, abandonment, apostasy, misrepresentation, falsification