palm off
English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]“Palming” an object (as in a playing card) is a type of sleight of hand, secretly removing the desired article and leaving only the undesired one.
Pronunciation
[edit]Audio (General Australian): (file)
Verb
[edit]palm off (third-person singular simple present palms off, present participle palming off, simple past and past participle palmed off)
- (idiomatic) To sell or dispose of (something) with the intent to deceive; to attempt to pass off a counterfeit or inferior product as genuine.
- 1871, Mark Twain, Journalism In Tennessee[1]:
- The inveterate liars of the Semi-Weekly Earthquake are evidently endeavoring to palm off upon a noble and chivalrous people another of their vile and brutal falsehoods […]
- 1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 18]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:
- […] the old mangy parcel he sent at Xmas a cottage cake and a bottle of hogwash he tried to palm off as claret that he couldnt[sic] get anyone to drink […]
- 1963, United States Code Annotated[2]:
- (p.359) […] no one is to be allowed fraudulently to palm off upon the public his goods as those of another.
(p.379) It is a fundamental rule that one man has no right to palm off his goods for sale as goods of a rival dealer […]
Usage notes
[edit]Sometimes appears as pawn off, though this is frequently proscribed as an error.[1][2] Some dictionaries have begun to recognize this form, and some have noted that the phrase pawn upon even predates palm off.[3][4] Often, pawn off differs slightly in meaning, not carrying the same connotations of trickery as palm off.[5]
The buyer is usually given as the object of "on" or "upon." So, "palm (something) off on (someone)"
Translations
[edit]to sell or dispose of something with the intent to deceive
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See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ Paul Brians, Common Errors in English Usage
- ^ "Pawn" at the Eggcorn Database
- ^ Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage, p722
- ^ Christine Ammer (1997) “pawn off”, in American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms, first edition, Houghton Mifflin Company, →ISBN, page 493.
- ^ David Olsen, The Words You Should Know, p101