Spell vs Trick - What's the difference?
spell | trick |
(obsolete) Speech, discourse.
Words or a formula supposed to have magical powers.
A magical effect or influence induced by an incantation or formula.
(obsolete) To speak, to declaim.
* 1590 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , I.ii:
(obsolete) To tell; to relate; to teach.
* T. Warton
To put under the influence of a spell; to affect by a spell; to bewitch; to fascinate; to charm.
* Dryden
* Sir G. Buck
(obsolete) To read (something) as though letter by letter; to peruse slowly or with effort.
* 1851 , :
To be able to write or say the letters that form words.
Of letters: to compose (a word).
* {{quote-book, year=2008, author=Helen Fryer, title=The Esperanto Teacher
, isbn=9780554320076, page=13, publisher=BiblioBazaar, LLC, passage=In Esperanto each letter has only one sound, and each sound is represented in only one way. The words are pronounced exactly as spelt , every letter being sounded.}}
(figuratively) To indicate that (some event) will occur.
* 2003 , U.S. Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbel, Hearing before the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation , ISBN 1422334120:
To constitute; to measure.
* Fuller
To work in place of (someone).
To rest (someone or something).
A shift (of work); a set of workers responsible for a specific turn of labour.
A period of (work or other activity).
*
, title= * {{quote-news, year=2012, date=April 22, author=Sam Sheringham, work=BBC Sport
, title= An indefinite period of time (usually with some qualifying word).
* 1975 , (Bob Dylan), (Tangled Up in Blue)
A period of rest; time off.
(US) A period of illness, or sudden interval of bad spirits, disease etc.
(cricket) An uninterrupted series of alternate overs bowled by a single bowler.
(slang) Stylish or cool.
Something designed to fool or swindle.
A single piece (or business) of a magician's (or any variety entertainer's) act.
An effective, clever or quick way of doing something.
* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-07-20, volume=408, issue=8845, magazine=(The Economist)
, title= Mischievous or annoying behavior; a prank.
(dated) A particular habit or manner; a peculiarity; a trait.
* William Shakespeare, King Lear act IV, scene VI:
* William Shakespeare,King John Act I, scene I
A knot, braid, or plait of hair.
(card games) A sequence in which each player plays a card and a winning play is determined.
* Alexander Pope
(slang) An act of prostitution. Generally used with turn .
(slang) A customer to a prostitute.
An entertaining difficult physical action.
A daily period of work, especially in shift-based jobs.
* 1885 , Order of Railway Conductors and Brakemen, The Conductor and Brakeman , page 496:
* 1899 , New York (State), Bureau of Statistics, Deptartment of Labor, Annual Report :
* 1949 , Labor arbitration reports , page 738:
(nautical) A sailor's spell of work at the helm, usually two hours long.
A toy; a trifle; a plaything.
To fool; to cause to believe something untrue; to deceive.
(heraldry) To draw (as opposed to blazon - to describe in words).
* 1600 , Hamlet , , by Shakespeare
* Ben Jonson
To dress; to decorate; to adorn fantastically; often followed by up'', ''off'', or ''out .
* Alexander Pope
* John Locke
* Macaulay
As nouns the difference between spell and trick
is that spell is (obsolete) speech, discourse or spell can be (dialectal) a splinter, usually of wood; a spelk or spell can be a shift (of work); a set of workers responsible for a specific turn of labour while trick is trick.As a verb spell
is (obsolete) to speak, to declaim or spell can be (obsolete) to read (something) as though letter by letter; to peruse slowly or with effort or spell can be to work in place of (someone).spell
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl) spel, spellian, spelian, from (etyl) .Noun
(en noun)- He cast a spell to cure warts.
- under a spell
Synonyms
* (words or formula supposed to have magical powers) cantrip, incantation * (magical effect induced by an incantation or formula) cantripVerb
(en verb)- O who can tell / The hidden power of herbes, and might of Magicke spell ?
- Might I that legend find, / By fairies spelt in mystic rhymes.
- Spelled with words of power.
- He was much spelled with Eleanor Talbot.
Etymology 2
From (etyl) .Verb
- "He'll do," said Bildad, eyeing me, and then went on spelling away at his book in a mumbling tone quite audible.
- I find it difficult to spell because I'm dyslexic.
- The letters “a”, “n” and “d” spell “and”.
citation
- This spells trouble.
- Please spell it out for me.
- When we get elected, for instance, we get one of these, and we are pretty much told what is in it, and it is our responsibility to read it and understand it, and if we do not, the Ethics Committee, we can call them any time of day and ask them to spell it out for us
- the Saxon heptarchy, when seven kings put together did spell but one in effect
Derived terms
* speller * spelling * spelloSynonyms
* (to indicate that some event will occur) forebode; mean; signify * (to work in place of someone else) relieve * (to compose a word) (informal) compriseEtymology 3
Origin uncertain; perhaps a form of (speld).Etymology 4
From (etyl) spelen, from (etyl) .Verb
- to spell the helmsman
- They spelled the horses and rested in the shade of some trees near a brook.
Noun
(en noun)Mr. Pratt's Patients, chapter=1 , passage=A chap named Eleazir Kendrick and I had chummed in together the summer afore and built a fish-weir and shanty at Setuckit Point, down Orham way. For a spell we done pretty well. Then there came a reg'lar terror of a sou'wester same as you don't get one summer in a thousand, and blowed the shanty flat and ripped about half of the weir poles out of the sand.}}
Liverpool 0-1 West Brom, passage=Despite his ill-fated spell at Anfield, he received a warm reception from the same Liverpool fans he struggled to win over before being sacked midway through last season.}}
- I had a job in the great North Woods
- Workin' as a cook for a spell .
- But I never did like it all that much
- And one day the ax just fell.
Derived terms
* dry spell * set a spellQuotations
* (English Citations of "spell")Anagrams
* 1000 English basic words ----trick
English
Adjective
(er)- Wow, your new sportscar is so trick .
Noun
(en noun)Welcome to the plastisphere, passage=Plastics are energy-rich substances, which is why many of them burn so readily. Any organism that could unlock and use that energy would do well in the Anthropocene. Terrestrial bacteria and fungi which can manage this trick are already familiar to experts in the field.}}
- the tricks of boys
- (Prior)
- a trick''' of drumming with the fingers; a '''trick of frowning
- The trick of that voice I do well remember.
- He hath a trick of Cœur de Lion's face.
- (Ben Jonson)
- On one nice trick depends the general fate.
- On third trick from 12 m. to 8 am, we have W. A. White, formerly operator at Wallula, who thus far has given general satisfaction.
- Woodside Junction—On 8 hour basis, first trick' $60, second '''trick''' $60, third ' trick $50.
- The Union contends that Fifer was entitled to promotion to the position of Group Leader on the third trick in the Core Room Department.
- (Shakespeare)
Synonyms
* (something designed to trick) artifice, con, gambit, ploy, rip-off, See also * (magic trick) illusion, magic trick, sleight of hand * (customer to a prostitute) john, see also * (entertaining difficult physical action) * (daily period of work) shiftVerb
(en verb)- You tried to trick me when you said that house was underpriced.
- The rugged Pyrrhus, he whose sable arms, / Black as his purpose, did the night resemble / When he lay couched in the ominous horse, / Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd / With heraldry more dismal; head to foot / Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd / With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons
- They forget that they are in the statutes: there they are tricked , they and their pedigrees.
- Trick her off in air.
- Tricking up their children in fine clothes.
- They are simple, but majestic, records of the feelings of the poet; as little tricked out for the public eye as his diary would have been.