Wiktionary

ruse

See also: Ruse, rusé, and ruše

English

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WOTD – 25 September 2018

Etymology

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From Middle English rūse (“evasive movements of a pursued animal; circuitous course taken by a hunter to pursue a game animal”), from Old French rëuse, ruse (“evasive movements of a pursued animal; trickery”)[1] (modern French ruse (“trick, ruse; cunning, guile”)), from ruser (“to use cunning, to be crafty, beguile”),[2] possibly from Latin rursus (“backward; on the contrary; again, in return”)[3] or Latin recūsāre, from recūsō (“to decline, refuse; to object to, protest, reject”). Doublet of recuse and rouse in the latter case.

The verb is derived from the noun. Compare Middle French ruser (“to use cunning, to be crafty, beguile”);[4] see further above.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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ruse (countable and uncountable, plural ruses)

  1. (countable, often hunting, archaic, rare) A turning or doubling back, especially of animals to get out of the way of hunting dogs.
    • 1867, J. T. Newall, chapter XVII, in Hog Hunting in the East, and Other Sports, London: Tinsley Brothers, […], →OCLC, pages 367–368:
      The boar was evidently most averse to leave the field in which he had spent so may pleasant hours of uninterrupted rest; […] He turned sharply to one flank; he stopped dead, and went away in the opposite direction as he heard the hunters gallop past; every ruse he tried, but tried in vain.
  2. (countable, by extension) An action intended to deceive; a trick.
    Near-synonyms: ploy, stratagem
    • 1839 November, “Cecil”, “Observations on Hunting, with Comparisons of the Usages of the Past and Present Days”, in The Sporting Magazine, or Monthly Calendar of the Transactions of the Turf, the Chase and Every Other Diversion Interesting to the Man of Pleasure, Enterprise & Spirit, volume XX (2nd Series; volume XCV, Old Series), number CXV, London: Published by [J.] Pittman, […], published 1840, →OCLC, page 53:
      It must be borne in mind that huntsmen sometimes make casts which they know must lose them their fox: […] At the same time, it would be bad policy to explain these little matters: some parties, who are not sufficiently acquainted with the management of hounds, might be discontented, whereas by such a ruse no offence is given, as nine-tenths of the Field are not aware that it is not the most likely cast to recover the scent.
    • 1857, [Thomas] Mayne, “How Congo the Kaffir Killed a Lioness”, in The Young Yägers: Or, A Narrative of Hunting Adventures in Southern Africa, London: David Bogue, […], →OCLC, pages 64–65:
      He was soon upon his feet, another assegai whistled through the air, and pierced through the neck of the lioness. But, as before, the wound was not fatal, and the animal, now enraged to a frenzy, charged once more upon her assailant. So rapid was her advance that it was with great difficulty Congo got under cover. A moment later, and his ruse would have failed, for the claws of the lion rattled upon the shield as it descended.
    • 1873 August 7, “Sixty-eighth Day.—Tuesday, August 7th, 1873.”, in [Edward] Kenealy, editor, The Trial at Bar of Sir Roger C. D. Tichborne, Bart., […], volume IV, London: "Englishman" Office, Bouverie Street, Fleet Street, London, published 1877, →OCLC, page 69, column 2:
      I have that strong impression on my mind that a person who is guilty of a ruse will hesitate at no falsehood. If it was a ruse, and if it was a deceit, you are to judge whether that elevates the persons in your mind who are parties to that trick.
    • 1922 May, Fred R. Hurworth, “The Alchemist: A Story of the Days of Robin Hood”, in The Boy’s Own Paper, volume XLV, part 7, London: "Boy's Own Paper" Office, […], →OCLC, chapter I, page 474, column 1:
      Soon, however, Courvoisier forced matters, when, despairing of ever catching the wily outlaw leader by fair means, he resorted to the ruse of carrying off Friar Tuck of Copmanhurst and holding him as a hostage.
    • 1993, L[eslie] C. Green, “Conduct of Hostilities: Maritime”, in The Contemporary Law of Armed Conflict (Melland Schill Monographs in International Law), Manchester, New York, N.Y.: Manchester University Press, →ISBN, page 169:
      Warships, whether surface or submarine, may use ruses and strategems. They may sail under false flags, both enemy and neutral, but before going into action whether at sea or if about to attack a land target they must strike any false colours and raise their own battle colours. It would be perfidy for them to use the red cross or crescent or any other protected emblem in this way.
    • 2005 November, John R. Meyer, “The Brave New World of Embryonic Stem Cell Research: Utilitarian Consequentialism and Faulty Moral Reasoning”, in Eugene F. Diamond, John J. Brennan, editors, The Linacre Quarterly: Journal of the Catholic Medical Association, volume 72, number 1, Needham, Mass.: Catholic Medical Association, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, footnote 2, page 327:
      The terminological distinction between reproductive and therapeutic cloning is a semantic ruse, as every instance of human cloning is a true reproducive act. That is to say, the intended purpose of this research is to produce a new human being with human embryonic stem cells.
    • 2012 August 12, Anthony Wile (interviewer), Jeffrey Tucker, “Exclusive Interview: Jeffrey Tucker on Laissez Faire Books, Intellectual Property Rights and ‘Beautiful Anarchy’”, in The Daily Bell‎[1], archived from the original on 8 August 2017:
      Politics is a dirty business, a ruse, an ideological cul-de-sac, a vast looter of intellectual and financial resources, a lie that corrupts, a deceiver, a means of unleashing vast evil in the world of the most unexpected and undetected sort and the greatest diverter of human productivity ever concocted by those who do not believe in authentic social and economic progress.
  3. (uncountable) Cunning, guile, trickery.
    • 1873, G[eorge] W[illiam] Kitchin, “The Deeds of Charles V, ‘the Wise.’ a.d. 1360–1380.”, in A History of France down to the Year 1453 (Clarendon Press Series), Oxford: At the University Press, →OCLC, pages 456–457:
      [H]e [Bertrand du Guesclin] had great natural cunning, that half-savage quality, was full of ruse and trick in war, he was contemptuous towards the high noblesse, but gentle to the poor, and generous to his friends.
    • 2005, Benerson Little, “Houses, Towns, and Cities Sacked: The Sea Rover as a Soldier”, in The Sea Rover’s Practice: Pirate Tactics and Techniques, 1630–1730, Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books, →ISBN; 1st paperback edition, Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books, 2007, →ISBN, page 190:
      A French privateer operating under an English commission raided Massacre Island at the mouth of Mobile Bay in 1710, robbing its warehouse of thousands of deerskins and other pelts, as well as of naval stores. They took the small place by ruse.
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Translations

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Verb

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ruse (third-person singular simple present ruses, present participle rusing, simple past and past participle rused)

  1. (intransitive) To deceive or trick using a ruse.
    • 1956, Herbert Gold, “Then Visited from the Jungle to Jungles”, in The Man who was Not with It, Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown and Company, →OCLC; republished as The Man who was Not with It (Second Edition Books), Chapel Hill, N.C.: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 1987, →ISBN, page 37:
      Anyway, no man can escape the woman he considers too much rused for him: tear her down or run away toward her if he can't meet her head-and-hind on.
    • 1985, Jean-François Lyotard, Jean-Loup Thébald, translated by Wlad Godzich, Just Gaming (Theory and History of Literature; 20), Minneapolis, Minn.: University of Minnesota Press, published 1999, →ISBN, page 41:
      And, in a way, s/he is already told, and what s/he him/herself is telling will not undo the fact that somewhere else s/he is told, but it will "ruse" with this; it will offer a variant in the form and even in the story.
    • 1998, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, “Finding Feminist Readings: Dante–Yeats”, in In Other Worlds: Essays in Cultural Politics, Abingdon, Oxon., New York, N.Y.: Routledge, →ISBN, page 21:
      Even at that, the most plausible way of understanding, "the text deconstructs itself" is surely that the text signals the itinerary of its desire to be "about something," and that this itinerary must ruse over the open-endedness of the field of meaning; at a certain point, it is possible to locate the moment when the rusing reveals itself as the structure of unresolvable self-cancellings.
    • 2009, Lee Kierig, “Ain’t No School, Quite Like, No Skool”, in Where, is Infinite Love? Public Welfare, Human Responsibility and Sustainability of Earth: A Letter to Humanity, New York, N.Y.: Strategic Book Publishing, →ISBN, page 225:
      In all types, manners and forms, empire “bilderz” come forward rusing out their favorite lines and spew. A sale just means yer not bein' gouged as much, doesn't it?
    • 2012, Paul de Man, “Mallarmé (1960)”, in Martin McQuillan, editor, The Post-Romantic Predicament, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, →ISBN, part II (Igitur), page 73:
      Moreover, since we have now reached an extreme point in the development of consciousness, and know our own selves through and through, no 'ultimate self-doubt' remains which would allow us to ruse with death – as when, in Pascal's wager, it is the doubt about the afterlife which determines the choice.
  2. (intransitive, hunting, archaic, rare) Of an animal: to turn or double back to elude hunters or their hunting dogs.
    • The template Template:rfc-sense does not use the parameter(s): 
      2=wrong language: by date, this is Middle English (enm) and not English (en). WP notes: "The text was presented for the first time ... in modern English", which is translation and not edition and yields another year
      Please see Module:checkparams for help with this warning.      (Can we clean up(+) this sense?)
      c. 1425, Edward, Second Duke of York [i.e., Edward of Norwich, 2nd Duke of York], “Of the Hart and His Nature”, in W[illia]m A[dolf] Baillie-Grohman, F[lorence] Baillie-Grohman, editors, The Master of Game by Edward, Second Duke of York: The Oldest English Book on Hunting, London: Chatto & Windus, published 1909, →OCLC, page 33:
      And he [the hart] fleeth then mightily and far from the hounds, that is to say he hath gone a great way from them, then he will go into the stank, and will soil therein once or twice in all the stank and then he will come out again by the same way that he went in, and then he shall ruse again the same way that he came (the length of) a bow shot or more, and then he shall ruse out of the way, for to stall or squatt to rest him, and that he doeth for he knoweth well that the hounds shall come by the fues [footing] into the stank where he was.
    • 1974, Marcelle Thiébaux, “Medieval Allegories of the Love Chase”, in The Stag of Love: The Chase in Medieval Literature, Ithaca, N.Y., London: Cornell University Press, published 2014, →ISBN, page 190:
      With these whelps [the hunting dogs] who know the way but are in danger of being baffled by the rusing stag, the hunter sends the reliable old harre (perseverance). He is indispensable, as he has often confronted the stag at bay.
    • 1988, “Hunt”, in Jean-Charles Seigneuret, editor, Dictionary of Literary Themes and Motifs, volumes 1 (A–J), Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, →ISBN, page 642:
      In the parallel hunt of Octovian, the hart has rused and momentarily escaped. With the death of White, the Knight's heart is wounded and his life is endangered but he escapes for a time as does the hart, though the hunter Death will ultimately be successful in both cases.
    • 1991, Thomas S. Henricks, “Sport in the Later Middle Ages”, in Disputed Pleasures: Sport and Society in Preindustrial England (Contributions to the Study of World History; no. 28), Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, →ISBN, →ISSN, page 46:
      Sometimes the stag would throw the hounds off the scent by a series of clever ruses—for example, by retracing a part of his path and leaping dramatically in one direction. […] Ultimately, the stag would tire, and its signals of exhaustion (short rusing runs, downwind flight, and the narrowing of the toe prints) would be evident to the trackers.

Translations

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References

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  1. ^ “rūse, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 13 May 2018.
  2. ^ “ruse, n.”, in OED Online  ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, March 2011.
  3. ^ “ruse”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
  4. ^ “ruse, v.2”, in OED Online  ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, March 2011.

Anagrams

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Danish

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Danish Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia da

Etymology

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From Old Danish ruse, ultimately from the same root as rør (“pipe, reed”), from which the rushes were braided. Also related to German Reuse (“fish-trap”).

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ruːsə/, [ˈʁoːsə]

Noun

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ruse c (singular definite rusen, plural indefinite ruser)

  1. fish-trap

Inflection

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Declension of ruse
common
gender 		Singular Plural
indefinite definite indefinite definite
nominative ruse rusen ruser ruserne
genitive ruses rusens rusers rusernes

Esperanto

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Etymology

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rusa (“Russian”) +‎ -e (adverbial suffix).

Pronunciation

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Adverb

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ruse

  1. in the Russian language
  2. in the manner of a Russian person
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French

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Etymology

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From ruser.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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ruse f (plural ruses)

  1. (uncountable) cunning, guile
  2. ruse, trick

Derived terms

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Further reading

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Anagrams

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Middle Dutch

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Etymology

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(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

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ruse m

  1. Russian

Inflection

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This noun needs an inflection-table template.

Derived terms

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Further reading

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Middle English

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Etymology 1

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borrowed from Anglo-Norman reuse, ruse; compare rusen.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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ruse (rare, Late Middle English)

  1. The evasive movements of a pursued animal.
  2. A circuitous course taken by a hunter to pursue a game animal.
Descendants
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  • English: ruse
References
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Etymology 2

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Verb

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ruse

  1. (Northern) Alternative form of rosen (“to boast”)

Etymology 3

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Verb

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ruse

  1. Alternative form of rusen

Norwegian Bokmål

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Pronunciation

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Etymology 1

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Possibly from a Celtic word, from Gaulish rusca, from Proto-Celtic *rūskos (“bark”), possibly from earlier *rukskos, from Proto-Indo-European *h₃rewk- (“to dig, till (soil)”), perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *h₃er- (“to move, stir, rise, quarrel”) or *Hrew- (“to tear out, dig out, open, acquire”).

Cognate with Danish ruse (“fish trap”), Swedish ryssja (“fish trap”) and German Reuse (“fish trap”).

Noun

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ruse f or m (definite singular rusa or rusen, indefinite plural ruser, definite plural rusene)

  1. fish trap

Etymology 2

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(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Verb

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ruse (imperative rus, present tense ruser, passive ruses, simple past rusa or ruset or ruste, past participle rusa or ruset or rust, present participle rusende)

  1. to rev an engine
  2. to rush

Etymology 3

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(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Verb

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ruse (imperative rus, present tense ruser, passive ruses, simple past and past participle rusa or ruset, present participle rusende)

  1. (reflexive) To use illegal drugs
  2. to intoxicate

References

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Norwegian Nynorsk

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Verb

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ruse

  1. Alternative form of rusa

Old French

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Etymology

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Probably based on Latin rursus (“backwards”)

Noun

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ruse oblique singular, f (oblique plural ruses, nominative singular ruse, nominative plural ruses)

  1. evasive movements of a pursued animal
  2. (by extension) trickery
  3. (by extension) dream; daydream; fantasy
  4. (by extension) lie; untruth

Descendants

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Further reading

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Polish

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Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ˈru.sɛ/
  • Rhymes: -usɛ
  • Syllabification: ru‧se

Adjective

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ruse

  1. inflection of rusy:
    1. neuter nominative/accusative/vocative singular
    2. nonvirile nominative/accusative/vocative plural

Romanian

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Pronunciation

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Adjective

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ruse f pl or n pl

  1. feminine/neuter plural of rus
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