"what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive" meaning in English

See what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Phrase

Etymology: Attributed to canto 6, stanza 17 in the 1808 poem Marmion by Sir Walter Scott: "O what a tangled web we weave,/ When first we practice to deceive" Head templates: {{head|en|phrase}} what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive
  1. When one tells a simple lie, it may become necessary to tell more complex lies, eventually spiraling out of control and leading to the exposure of said deceit. Synonyms: what tangled webs we weave when first we practice to deceive Related terms: lies beget more lies
    Sense id: en-what_a_tangled_web_we_weave_when_first_we_practice_to_deceive-en-phrase-x1BEpjwE Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English entries with language name categories using raw markup, English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive meaning in English (1.5kB)

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  "etymology_text": "Attributed to canto 6, stanza 17 in the 1808 poem Marmion by Sir Walter Scott: \"O what a tangled web we weave,/ When first we practice to deceive\"",
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      ],
      "glosses": [
        "When one tells a simple lie, it may become necessary to tell more complex lies, eventually spiraling out of control and leading to the exposure of said deceit."
      ],
      "id": "en-what_a_tangled_web_we_weave_when_first_we_practice_to_deceive-en-phrase-x1BEpjwE",
      "links": [
        [
          "lie",
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        [
          "out of control",
          "out of control"
        ],
        [
          "deceit",
          "deceit"
        ]
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "lies beget more lies"
        }
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "what tangled webs we weave when first we practice to deceive"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive"
}

{
  "etymology_text": "Attributed to canto 6, stanza 17 in the 1808 poem Marmion by Sir Walter Scott: \"O what a tangled web we weave,/ When first we practice to deceive\"",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "phrase"
      },
      "expansion": "what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive",
      "name": "head"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "lies beget more lies"
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  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
        "English lemmas",
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      ],
      "glosses": [
        "When one tells a simple lie, it may become necessary to tell more complex lies, eventually spiraling out of control and leading to the exposure of said deceit."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
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        ],
        [
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          "out of control"
        ],
        [
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        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "what tangled webs we weave when first we practice to deceive"
    }
  ],
  "word": "what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.