complicity

Etymology

Most dictionaries take it as borrowed from French complicité,^[2][3][4][5] formed on complice (“accomplice, companion”), recorded in Old French from the 14th century,^[2][3] which is from Late Latin complex (“partner, confederate”) (accusative complicem),^[2][3][6] from Latin complicō (“to fold together”), formed from com- (“together”) and plicō (“to fold”),^[2][3] from Proto-Indo-European *plek- (“to plait”).^[2] The Anglo-Norman complice, accomplice, is recorded from 1330.^[7] Hoad derives the English word from the obsolete noun complice, recorded from the 15th century, perhaps partly after the French,^[8][9][10] while the OED and Klein trace it to an unattested Vulgar Latin *complicitās, a noun of state formed on complex like Latin simplicitās and duplicitās.^[11][12]

Earliest recorded meaning

The state of being an accomplice; partnership in a wrongful act: 1656, in Blount's Glossographia.^[11][3] Merriam-Webster dates it to about 1656,^[4] and Etymonline to the 1650s.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Skeat cites Cotgrave's French–English dictionary for the French word, glossed "a bad confederacy".^[6] Hoad notes that the English word was rare before the 19th century.^[8] From 1847, first in Craig's dictionary, it was also used for "complexity",^[11] a sense now rare.^[13][14]

Timeline

• 1656 – partnership in a wrongful act.^[11][3]
• 1847 – complexity.^[11][13]

Meanings

Noun

1. Involvement as an accomplice in a crime or other wrongful act: The minister denied any complicity in the cover-up.^[14][4][11]
2. An instance of such involvement.^[15][4]
3. (rare) Complexity.^[13][14][11]

Word family

• complicitous
• noncomplicity

Related words

• accomplice
• complicit
• complex
• complicate

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam
6. ^ a b Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
8. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c d e f g Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
13. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
14. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
15. ^ Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster