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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

filch.

To illegally take possession of (something, especially items of low value); to pilfer, to steal.

5 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

verb/fɪlt͡ʃ/General-American, Received-Pronunciation
  1. To illegally take possession of (something, especially items of low value); to pilfer, to steal.

    transitive
    Hey, someone filched my wallet!
Where this word comes from

From Middle English filchen (“to pilfer, steal”). The further origin of the word is uncertain, but it is likely from or related to Old English fylċian (“to marshal troops”) and Old English ġefylċe (“band of men, army, host”), which would make it also related to folk.

noun/fɪlt͡ʃ/General-American, Received-Pronunciation
  1. Something which has been filched or stolen.

  2. An act of filching; larceny, theft.

  3. A person who filches; a filcher, a pilferer, a thief.

    obsolete
  4. A hooked stick used to filch objects.

    obsolete
Where this word comes from

From Middle English filchen (“to pilfer, steal”). The further origin of the word is uncertain, but it is likely from or related to Old English fylċian (“to marshal troops”) and Old English ġefylċe (“band of men, army, host”), which would make it also related to folk.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.