dissembler

Etymology

It is formed from English dissemble + -er.^[1][2][3] The verb, recorded before 1420 in Lydgate's “Troy Book”, is an alteration of Middle English dissimulen (“to disguise, make believe”),^[4][5] which Barnhart finds in 1380 in Chaucer's “Canterbury Tales”,^[4] from Middle French dissimuler and directly from Latin dissimulō (“to disguise, conceal”),^[4] formed from dis- (“completely”) and simulō (“to make like, imitate, pretend”),^[2][4] from the stem of similis (“like”).^[2] Merriam-Webster and Barnhart see the influence of Middle French dessembler (“to be unlike”) in the changed form.^[6][4] The Oxford Dictionary of English points instead to semblance,^[7] Etymonline to resemble,^[2] and Collins and Dictionary.com to the obsolete verb semble.^[8][5] The American Heritage Dictionary takes the verb directly from Old French dessembler.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

One who conceals real purposes under a false appearance: 1526, in W. Bonde's Pylgrimage of Perfection.^[1][10] Etymonline likewise dates the word to the 1520s.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The meaning has stayed close to that of the verb: someone who hides what is really the case.^[1][2] Johnson (1755) defines it as "an hypocrite; a man who conceals his true disposition", quoting Shakespeare ("Thou dost wrong me, thou dissembler, thou") and Bacon on the French king as "the greater dissembler of the two".^[3]

Timeline

• 1526 – one who conceals real purposes under a false appearance.^[1][10][2]

Meanings

Noun

1. One who hides true feelings or purposes under a false appearance; a deceiver or hypocrite: A practised dissembler, he praised the plan he had already decided to wreck.^[1][6][3]

Related words

• dissemble
• dissimulate
• simulate
• similar
• semblance
• resemble

Usage notes

Etymonline quotes a distinction between the two words: a dissembler tries to conceal what he is, while a hypocrite tries to appear to be what he is not, especially to seem better than he is.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
4. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
10. ^ a b Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)