ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

underhanded.

Done by moving the hand (and arm) from below.

11 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj

Done by moving the hand (and arm) from below.
Sly, dishonest, corrupt, cheating.
His underhanded trick backfired and he was disqualified.
Insincere; sarcastic.
An underhanded compliment is actually criticism.
Secret; surreptitious.
Understaffed.

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₁én Proto-Indo-European *-tér Proto-Indo-European *h₁entér Proto-Indo-European *h₂én Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁-? Proto-Indo-European *-dʰi ? Proto-Indo-European *(H)n̥dʰí Proto-Indo-European *-ér Proto-Indo-European *(H)n̥dʰér Proto-Germanic *under Proto-West Germanic *undar Old English under- Middle English under- English under- Proto-Germanic *handuz Proto-West Germanic *handu Old English hand Middle English hond English hand Old English -ed Proto-Indo-European *-h₂ Proto-Indo-European *-éh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-tós Proto-Indo-European *-eh₂tos Proto-Germanic *-ōdaz Old English -od Middle English -ed English -ed English handed English underhanded From under- + handed.

adv

In an underhanded manner.

Where this word comes from

noun

Devious people, collectively.
plural · plural-only

Where this word comes from

verb

simple past and past participle of underhand
form-of · participle · past

Where this word comes from

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

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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.