Spivvery

//ˈspɪvəɹi// noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Behaviour characteristic of a spiv; crookery, petty crime. countable, uncountable

    "The Government decided the issues in accordance with the best principles, he said: "The weak first; and the strong next." Mr. Churchill preferred a free-for-all, but what was Toryism except organised Spivvery?"

Example

More examples

"The Government decided the issues in accordance with the best principles, he said: "The weak first; and the strong next." Mr. Churchill preferred a free-for-all, but what was Toryism except organised Spivvery?"

Etymology

From spiv + -ery.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.