FromLatinpraetextum(“an ornament, etc., wrought in front, a pretense”), neuter ofpraetextus, past participle ofpraetexere(“to weave before, fringe or border, allege”).^[1]

• IPA^(key):/ˈpɹiːtɛkst/

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• Rhymes:-iːtɛkst
• Hyphenation:pre‧text

pretext (pluralpretexts)

1. Afalse,contrived, orassumedpurpose orreason; apretense.

   Synonyms:seeThesaurus:pretext

   The reporter called the company on thepretext of trying to resolve a consumer complaint.

   • 1598, Beniamin Ionson [i.e.,Ben Jonson], “Euery Man in His Humour. A Comœdie. […]”, inThe Workes of Beniamin Ionson (First Folio), London:[…]Will[iam] Stansby, published1616,→OCLC, Act II, scene i,page21:

     [T]hey would ſay [...] that I had quarrell'd / My brother purpoſely, thereby to finde / An aptpretext, to baniſh them my houſe.

   • 1834,L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter VII, inFrancesca Carrara. […], volume II, London:Richard Bentley, […], (successor toHenry Colburn),→OCLC,page69:

     "After all," said the Chevalier, "these portraits—Madame de I'Hôpital's fortune-telling—the pleasure we take in a lover or a physician—may all be referred to the same cause,—we do so enjoy talking about ourselves; and yet we feel some sort of excuse necessary. It must be admitted, that we are ready inpretexts."

   • 1943 November –1944 February (date written; published1945 August 17),George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair],Animal Farm […], London:Secker & Warburg, publishedMay 1962,→OCLC:

     On every kind ofpretext she would run away from work [...]

   • 1996,Jacques Gernet, translated by J. R. Foster and Charles Hartman,A History of Chinese Civilization‎^[1], 2nd edition,Cambridge University Press,→ISBN,→OCLC,page580:

     The smallest incidents were to serve aspretexts for demonstrations of force and for demands for indemnities and reparations which increased China's subjection.

   • 2012 May 27,Nathan Rabin, “The Simpsons (Classic): ‘New Kid on the Block’ [season 4, episode 8; originally aired 12 November 1992]”, inThe A.V. Club‎^[2], archived fromthe original on18 September 2020:

     When that metaphor proves untenable, he switches to insisting that women are like beer but that’s mainly as apretext to drink until he passes out in a father-son bonding haze.

pretext (third-person singular simple presentpretexts,present participlepretexting,simple past and past participlepretexted)

1. To employ a pretext, which involves using afalse orcontrived purpose for soliciting the gain of something else.

   The spy obtained his phone records using possibly-illegalpretexting methods.

   • 1903 September 28,Henry James,The Ambassadors, London:Methuen & Co. […],→OCLC:

     […] the something in the air of these establishments; the vibration of the vast, strange life of the town; the influence of the types, the performers, concocting their messages; the little prompt Paris women arranging,pretexting goodness knew what, driving the dreadful needle-pointed public pen at the dreadful sand-strewn public table[…]

   • 1970 August 12 [1969 January 15],John Womack, Jr.,Zapata and the Mexican Revolution‎^[3], New York: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group,→ISBN,→LCCN,→OCLC,→OL,page261:

     Not all the surviving veteran chiefs would actually fight. Some remained nominally in the resistance but in practice delayed at their bases,pretexting a lack of ammunition for their uncertain inertia.

• blag(UK)

•  Social engineering on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “pretext”, inWebster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.:G. & C. Merriam,1913,→OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney,Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “pretext”, inThe Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.:The Century Co.,→OCLC.

Borrowed fromFrenchprétexte.

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pretext n (pluralpretexte)

1. pretext

• prætext(archaic)

Borrowed fromLatinpraetextum. First attested in 1617.^[1]

pretext c

1. (archaic)pretext

   Synonyms:förevändning,svepskäl,täckmantel,undanflykt

   • 1705 September 6,Robert Petre (the younger), edited byAugust Quennerstedt,Robert Petrés dagbok ifrån år 1702 till slaget vid Pultava (diary), published1901,page83:

     […] om deri skulle finnas något gewehr och amunition, som war emoth accord, men underprætext der af togz bårt, wad dem anstod och blänkte för deras ögon,[…]

     […] if there should be any rifle and ammunition therein, who were against accord, but under thepretext of which was taken away, what suited them and shone before their eyes,[…]

   • 1897 December 7,August Strindberg, edited byTorsten Eklund,August Strindbergs brev. 12. December 1896–augusti 1898 (letter), TillEmil Kléen,page231:

     Skalden, hvilken har journalismen som näringsfång borde medan han är jemförelsevis ung göra en studieresa till Europens hufvudstad, Paris; t.ex. underpretext studera journalism och telegrambyråkratism.

     The poet, who has journalism as a livelihood, while he is comparatively young, should make a study trip to the capital of Europe, Paris; for example under thepretext of studying journalism and telegram bureaucracy.