English edit

Etymology edit

From Italian ingannazione, nominal form derived from ingannare (deceive, cheat, betray) from Vulgar Latin ingannāre, present active infinitive of ingannō, from Latin gannō.

Noun edit

ingannation (countable and uncountable, plural ingannations)

  1. (obsolete) Cheating; deception.
    • 1646, Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica[1], London: Edw. Dod & Nath. Ekins, published 1650, Book I, Chapter 3, p. 9:
      Thus having been deceived by themselves, and continually deluded by others, they must needs be stuffed with errors [] whereunto whosoever shall resigne their reasons, either from the root of deceit in themselves, or inability to resist such triviall ingannations from others; although their condition and fortunes may place them many Spheres above the multitude, yet are they still within the line of vulgarity, and Democraticall enemies of truth.
    • 1877, Nathaniel Ramsay Waters, Through Rome On: A Memoir of Christian and Extra-Christian Experience[2], New York: C.P. Somerby, page 199:
      While I am not able by any kind of searching to find out God, in the sense of the religions, while I get no glimpse whatever of any source of nature, and refuse to beguile myself or others with any ingannation or pretence on the subject, I have nevertheless as deep and as constraining a faith as any theist can possibly have, in the holiness and power which are in nature []
    • 1907, Edwin Sauter, “The Street,” V, in Satires, Boston: R.G. Badger, p. 37,[3]
      Trade asks but two thoughts to insure success—
      Sell much and cheaply,—but first buy for less:
      And close as mortar cleaveth unto bricks,
      To buying and selling ingannation sticks.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “ingannation”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)