DECOY • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Decoy

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/dəkˈɔɪ/ Listen

noun

Decoy n.

Anything intended to lead into a snare; a lure that deceives and misleads into danger, or into the power of an enemy; a bait.

A fowl, or the likeness of one, used by sportsmen to entice other fowl into a net or within shot.

A place into which wild fowl, esp. ducks, are enticed in order to take or shoot them.

A person employed by officers of justice, or parties exposed to injury, to induce a suspected person to commit an offense under circumstances that will lead to his detection.

verb

Decoy v. t. (past & past part. decoyed; pres. part. decoying) To lead into danger by artifice; to lure into a net or snare; to entrap; to insnare; to allure; to entice; as, to decoy troops into an ambush; to decoy ducks into a net. "Did to a lonely cot his steps decoy." "E'en while fashion's brightest arts decoy, The heart, distrusting, asks if this be joy."

Synonyms: To entice; tempt; allure; lure. See Allure.

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Etymology of 'Decoy'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Decoy" Quotes from Famous Books

... allowed to look at an article quite different from the one he has been so intent upon; his object being that the dealer may not awaken to a sense of the coveted article's value by a stranger seeming to be interested in it. After examining the decoy bird, he returns it, and carelessly asks to look at the article. Whatever the value set upon it may be, he tenders exactly the half, the matter being usually settled by what is technically known as "splitting the difference." Delighted with his purchase, he carries it home, and persuades ...

— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart

... grass, and mumbling "Te Deum laudamus." "Unktomee[72]—Ho!" muttered the braves, for they deemed him the black Spider-Spirit That dwells in the drearisome caves, and walks on the marshes at midnight, With a flickering torch in his hand, to decoy to his den the unwary. His tongue could they not understand, but his torn hands all shriveled with famine He stretched to the hunters and said: "He feedeth his chosen with manna; And ye are the angels of God sent to save me from death in the ...

— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon

... that counseled a neglected wife to show an interest in another man. Charity was tempted to use Jim Dyckman as a decoy for her own wild duck; but Dyckman had sailed away in his new yacht, on a cruise ...

— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes

... politician. "You may go round," and round we went, not a little amused at such an exhibition of enthusiasm. I remember very well the excitement during the campaign of 1840; and I did my share with the New Hampshire boys in getting up decoy cider barrels to humbug the Whigs as they passed in their barouches to attend some great convention or hear Daniel Webster. But it seems to me there is much more political excitement during this campaign than there was in 1840. Flagstaffs and banners ...

— Minnesota and Dacotah • C.C. Andrews

... Returning from Modon with a number of families, he touched at the islands of Corsica and Minorca, added another vessel to his fleet, and increased the number of his settlers to fifteen hundred. With exciting promises did he decoy them to his land of Egypt, which proved a bondage to his shame. He would give them lands, free passages, good provisions and clothing; but none of these promises did he keep. A long passage of four months found many victims to its hardships, and those who arrived ...

— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

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