Purloining

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. The act of secretly taking someone else's belongings without authorization, typically with the intention of keeping them, is referred to as theft
2. Engaging in the covert removal of another's possessions without consent generally denotes a deceitful appropriation
3. The clandestine act of taking possession of another's property without permission usually signifies an intention to permanently deprive the rightful owner of it

Etymology: "Purloining" is the present participle of "purloin," which comes from Middle English "purloynen," meaning "to remove." That Middle English word was borrowed from Anglo-Norman "purloigner," literally "to put far away," a variant of Old French "porloignier." The sense of distance is the heart of the story: the word began as a plain description of moving something somewhere out of reach, and only later narrowed to the act of carrying off what isn't yours. The Old French root is "loin," meaning "far," from Latin "longe," the same source as English "long" in its sense of distance. This is why "purloin" is a doublet of "prolong," which came into English along a different path and kept the sense of extending something in time or space. Both words grew from the same Old French stem, one stretching a thing out and the other pushing it away.

Synonyms: stealing, theft, filching

Antonyms: returning, restoring