bilk

bilk (bɪlk)

—vb
1.	to balk; thwart
2.	(often foll by of) to cheat or deceive, esp to avoid making payment to
3.	to escape from; elude
4.	cribbage to play a card that hinders (one's opponent) from scoring in his or her crib

—n
5.	a swindle or cheat
6.	a person who swindles or cheats

[C17: perhaps variant of balk]

'bilker

—n

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

bilk

1650s, from the noun (1630s), first used as a cribbage term. Origin obscure, it was believed in 17c. to be "a word signifying nothing," perhaps of Arabic origin; but it is rather perhaps a thinned form of balk. Meaning "to defraud" is first recorded 1670s.

Example sentences

The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that she was overtly complicit in his

scheme to bilk billions from unsuspecting investors.

Until recently, defrauders tried to bilk homeowners out of the equity in their

homes.

Others are sent in an attempt to bilk money from people to damage reputations.

Some local officials who used regulations to bilk the public have been dealt

with harshly.

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Related Words

defraud

Matching Quote

"If you look into your own mind, which are you, Don Quixote or Sancho Panza? Almost certainly you are both. There is one part of you that wishes to be a hero or a saint, but another part of you is a fat little man who sees very clearly the advantages of staying alive with a whole skin. He is your unofficial self, the voice of the belly protesting against the soul, his tastes lie towards safety, soft beds, no work, pots of beer and women with "voluptuous" figures. He it is who punctures your fine attitudes and urges you to look after Number One, to be unfaithful to your wife, to bilk your debts, and so on and so forth. Whether you allow yourself to be influenced by him is a different question. But it is simply a lie to say that he is not part of you, just as it is a lie to say that Don Quixote is not part of you either."

-George Orwell