villainy

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   wicked, criminal, or treacherous behavior or character

   The novel portrays the minister's corruption as calculated villainy.

2. 2
   noun

   a wicked or criminal act

   The inquiry exposed years of fraud and other villainies committed by the group.

From Middle English vileinie through Anglo-Norman and Old French vilenie. The French word was related to vilein, a farm laborer or person of low social status, from Medieval Latin villanus, 'worker on an estate.' A class-based sense of low or base conduct gradually developed into the modern moral sense of wickedness.

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