| 释义 |
▪ I. † ploy, n.1 Obs.
Also 6 ploye.
[a. OF. ploi m. or ploie f.:—late L. *plica a fold. Cf. MDu. plôie, Du. plooi, MLG. ploy a fold, also from Fr.]
? A ply or fold.
1550–1600Customs Duties (B.M. Add. MS. 25097), Henego cloth in longe ploye, the pece xxiiij s. 1662Stat. Irel. (1765) II. 411 Elbing or Dansk cloth double ploy.
▪ II. † ploy, n.2 Sc. Obs.
[ad. F. ploit (Burguy) = plait, plai, plea.]
‘An action at Law’ (Jam.).
c1575Balfour's Practicks (1754) 240 Gif ony persoun being in veritie bastard..deceissis befoir ony ploy, or clame, or pley, be intentit aganis him be the richteous air.
▪ III. ploy, n.3 orig. Sc. and north. Eng.|plɔɪ|
[Of uncertain origin.
Some uses suggest an aphetic form of employ n. 3, ‘that on which one employs oneself, or finds occupation’; but evidence is wanting.]
1. Anything in which one personally engages; a piece of action, a proceeding, esp. one in which one amuses himself; a personal enterprise or pursuit, a hobby, a piece of amusement; a game, pastime, or sport; a frolic or escapade; a trick.
1722W. Hamilton Wallace x. iv. (1774) 205 John was a cliver and auldfarrand boy, As you shall hear by the ensuing ploy. 1768Ross Helenore ii. 84 Says Colen, for he was a sicker boy, Neiper, I fear this is a kittle ploy. 1796Macneill Will & Jean ii. xxvi, Think o' nought but rural quiet, Rural labour! rural ploys! 1814Scott Wav. lxiv, Twa unlucky red-coats were up for black-fishing, or some siccan ploy. 1818― Hrt. Midl. xviii, One woman is enough to dark the fairest ploy that ever was planned. 1881Blackw. Mag. Apr. 530 They gathered from great distances to such ploys as the sheep-shearing or the sheep-washing. 1900L. Huxley Life Huxley I. xviii. 253 He went off for a ploy with Tyndall..into Derbyshire. 1916E. F. Benson David Blaize xi. 208, I think you're rather an ass, unless you prefer writing out the ‘æneid’ to any other ploy. 1926R. Macaulay Crewe Train ii. viii. 159 Whatever ploy she had on hand at the moment, such as lead casting, table tennis, or naval battles in the bath. 1930Times 16 Apr. 15/4 Training in domestic ploys such as household work. 1936A. Christie Cards on Table xviii. 175 You'd gone off on your own ploys with the boy friend. 1936‘J. Tey’ Shilling for Candles xxiii. 257 Smuggling Edward Champnels might descend to, as a ploy, a mere bit of excitement. 1953J. Trench Docken Dead ii. 27 He's obviously gone off on some ploy of his own. 1959‘M. Neville’ Sweet Night for Murder xi. 106 ‘Did you ever accompany her while she was shopping for clothes?’.. ‘I wouldn't be much good at that sort of ploy... She didn't need anyone to help her choose what to wear.’ 1979Country Life 8 Nov. 1687/1 The search for the alternative life style is..a new rationalisation of a ruralising ploy.
2. A move or gambit suggested by particular circumstances and made in order to gain a calculated advantage, esp. self-advancement or the frustration of an opponent's intentions; a planned device or manœuvre.
1950S. Potter Lifemanship 15 Each one of us can, by ploy or gambit, most naturally gain the advantage. Ibid. 90 P. Lewis, expert in Oxford Undergraduateship, has set it down as basic to this ploy that, where the Layman would concentrate on his subject, the Gamesman concentrates on his tutor. 1955Times 24 June 10/3 Apart from claiming possible support in London and Glasgow and assuring the men that there would be ‘important developments during the next 48 hours’—a ploy with which the strikers are becoming a little disillusioned—the speakers had nothing to offer. 1957Listener 13 June 967/3 It is a common ‘ploy’ of reviewers to take the opportunity of a review to air their own views. 1957Economist 5 Oct. 69/1 Conventional East-West political ploys that took the form of proposing, and rejecting rather more sharply than usual, the suggestion that non⁓members of the United Nations, such as Red China, should be admitted as observers. 1958A. Wilson in Times Lit. Suppl. 15 Aug. p. viii/2 Whatever the ingenious and at times embarrassing ploys with which English novelists periodically assert their amateur, their unintellectual or their purely entertaining status..they are..concerned always to be serious. 1960‘W. Haggard’ Closed Circuit viii. 105 For suspects there is a standard ploy. You test them. 1966Listener 13 Jan. 78/3 If West held the queen of spades, as he did, it would be East's duty to guard the suit. The only way to accomplish this end was by the unusual ploy of discarding a trump on the third round of clubs. 1970G. F. Newman Sir, You Bastard 267 Perhaps she should cook it and leave it for him, but she recognized that thought as a ploy to delay herself, hoping that he'd return and prevent her departure.
▪ IV. ploy, v.
[In sense 1, a. F. ployer:—L. plicāre to bend: see ply v.; cf. MDu. ployen, Du. plooijen, MLG. ploien, LG. plojen. In sense 2 app. aphetic for employ; in sense 3, perh. back-formation from deploy.]
†1. intr. and trans. To bend. Obs.
1481Caxton Myrr. ii. xxiv. 116 Yf it fonde not thayer thycke, it shold not bowe ne ploye. 1578Lyte Dodoens vi. vi. 663 Twigges lyke rushes, the whiche are easy to ploy and twist any way without breaking.
2. trans. To employ. dial.
1670Covel Diary (Hakl. Soc.) 262 At all these we ployed our wooden artillery of the spoon. 1871Jones Nhb. 212 (E.D.D.) Gin ye ploy ony fair, hard-workin' lassie. Ibid. 263 Macduff, wha was ployed amang the flower-beds.
3. Mil. trans. To move (troops) from line into column. Also intr. said of the troops. (The opposite of deploy.)
1840Sir C. Napier Mil. Life II. iv. vii. 213 There..they acquire the art of ploying and deploying their troops. 1864in Webster.
Hence ˈployment, formation of column from line.
1890in Cent. Dict. |