Meaning & use
purloining
Last updated
Stealing something, especially in a sly or stealthy manner.
See it in a sentence
The clerk was caught purloining small amounts of cash from the register.
In the story, a raven is accused of purloining a shiny trinket from the windowsill.
A note on using this word
From Anglo-French 'purloigner,' meaning 'to remove to a distance'; it survives in modern English mainly in formal or literary contexts, as in Poe's 'The Purloined Letter.'
Words with a similar meaning
Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.
Words with an opposite meaning
returning
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