shell game in English

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{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "shell game",
      "raw_tags": [
        "Expression"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "expansion": "[POS TABLE]",
      "name": "expression"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
  "senses": [
    {
      "glosses": [
        "A shell game is a game where one player tries to guess which of three small cups (or shells) a small object is hidden under after the other player quickly rearranges their positions."
      ],
      "id": "simple-shell_game-en-phrase-twGELDzS"
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "A shell game is a dishonest activity designed to make people expect one outcome, which is not the intended outcome."
      ],
      "id": "simple-shell_game-en-phrase-ohoa4QSH"
    }
  ],
  "word": "shell game"
}

[Show JSON for raw wiktextract data ▼] [Hide JSON for raw wiktextract data ▲]

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "shell game",
      "raw_tags": [
        "Expression"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "expansion": "[POS TABLE]",
      "name": "expression"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
  "senses": [
    {
      "glosses": [
        "A shell game is a game where one player tries to guess which of three small cups (or shells) a small object is hidden under after the other player quickly rearranges their positions."
      ]
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "A shell game is a dishonest activity designed to make people expect one outcome, which is not the intended outcome."
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "shell game"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-09-12 from the simplewiktionary dump dated 2025-09-01 using wiktextract (87a8c9b and 8a561cd). 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.

"shell game" meaning in English

Phrase