spiv
Plural: spivs
Noun
- A person, especially a man, living by dishonest means.
- a person without employment who makes money by various dubious schemes; goes about smartly dressed and having a good time
- A smartly dressed person who trades in illicit, black-market or stolen goods, especially during World War II.
- A flashy con artist, often homeless, who lives by his wits.
- A low and common thief.
- A slacker; one who shirks responsibility.
Examples
- Only a SPIV would dare to cheat by looking up words on their phone during a Scrabble game.
Origin / Etymology
Unknown. Perhaps from spiff, spiffy. Spiv was the nickname of Henry Bagster, a Londoner arrested a number of times in 1904-6 for activities as described below, and may have been the archetype. Also possibly from Romani spiv (“sparrow”), as active and opportunistic.
Synonyms
Scandaroon, bristler, bunco artist, bunco-steerer, charlatan, cheat, cheater, chiseler, con artist, confidence artist, confidence trickster, conman, cozener, defrauder, finagler, fleecer, flimflammer, fraud, fraudmeister, fraudster, goldbrick, grifter, gull, gyp, humbug, landshark, lugger, magsman, mountebank, pickpenny, rook, saltimbanco, scammer, scamp, schemester, shark-gull, sharker, sharper, sharpster, slicker, smooth operator, spieler, spiv, swindler, trapan, trepan, wide boy
Scrabble Score: 9
spiv: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordspiv: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
spiv: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary