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hocus

[hoh-kuh s]
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SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR hocus ON THESAURUS.COM

verb (used with object), ho·cused, ho·cus·ing or (especially British) ho·cussed, ho·cus·sing.

to play a trick on; hoax; cheat.
to stupefy with drugged liquor.
to drug (liquor).

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The story of hokey shows how tangled the backstory of words can sometimes seem to be. Hokey first appeared after World War II as American slang for “overly sentimental” or “contrived. The term’s immediate predecessor seems to be hokum, a blunt American term for “nonsense,” coined earlier in the 20th century by combining hocus-pocus (or hokey-pokey) with bunkum, another word which also means “nonsense.” Hocus-pocus …
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RELATED WORDS

abracadabra, mystification, nonsense, hoax, incantation, cant, artifice, jargon, cheating, deception, trickery, imposture, delusion, spell, flimflam, chicanery, charm, deceit, swindle, humbug

Origin of hocus

First recorded in 1665–75; short for hocus-pocus
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for hocus

Contemporary Examples of hocus

Historical Examples of hocus

  • And he refers his readers to his Spanish-Gipsy vocabulary for the words hoax and hocus, as a reason for such an opinion!

  • My aunt began her hocus pocus by throwing out all the cards in the pack under seven.

  • Hocus loved her best, believing her to be his own, got upon the body of Mrs. Bull.

  • Hocus pocus, gipsy words of magic, similar to the modern presto fly.

    The Slang Dictionary

    John Camden Hotten

  • Hocus fed her extravagancy (what was still more shameful) with John's own money.

British Dictionary definitions for hocus

hocus

verb -cuses, -cusing, -cused, -cuses, -cussing or -cussed (tr) rare

to take in; trick
to stupefy, esp with a drug
to add a drug to (a drink)
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012