smuggle

smuggle

English

Alternative forms

• smuckle (dialectal)

Etymology

From earlier smuckle, either from Dutch smokkelen (“to smuggle”), a frequentative form of Middle Dutch smūken (“to act secretly, be sneaky”), or from Dutch Low Saxon or German Low German smuggeln. The Dutch and Low German words are both ultimately from Proto-Germanic *smeuganą (“to creep; slip through or into”), from Proto-Indo-European *smewk-, *smewg- (“to slip, glide; be slimy”).

cognates and related terms

Cognate with Saterland Frisian smukkeln (“to move insidiously, smuggle”), West Frisian smokkelje (“to smuggle”), German schmuggeln (“to smuggle”), Danish smugle (“to smuggle”), Swedish smuggla (“to smuggle”). Related also to Icelandic smjúga (“to creep, penetrate”), Swedish smyga (“to sneak, slip, crawl, lurk, steal”), German schmiegen (“to nestle, wrap, snuggle”), Old English smēogan, smūgan (“to creep, crawl, move gradually, penetrate”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈsmʌɡəl/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ʌɡəl

Verb

smuggle (third-person singular simple present smuggles, present participle smuggling, simple past and past participle smuggled)

1. (transitive, intransitive) To import or export, illicitly or by stealth, without paying lawful customs charges or duties
   • 2018 July 20, “Lorry driver jailed for smuggling illegal immigrants into UK”, in cps.gov.uk‎, London: Crown Prosecution Service, retrieved 2018-07-20:

     A lorry driver who smuggled illegal immigrants into the UK in the back of his trailer has been jailed.

2. (transitive) To bring in surreptitiously
   • 22 March 2012, Scott Tobias, AV Club The Hunger Games

     While Collins does include a love triangle, a coming-of-age story, and other YA-friendly elements in the mix, they serve as a Trojan horse to smuggle readers into a hopeless world where love becomes a stratagem and growing up is a matter of basic survival.

3. (transitive, obsolete) To fondle or cuddle.
4. (slang) To thrash or be thrashed by a bear's claws, or to swipe at or be swiped at by a person's arms in a bearlike manner.

Derived terms

• smuggling
• smuggler

Translations

to import or export, illicitly or by stealth, without paying lawful customs charges or duties

Afrikaans: smokkel Albanian: please add this translation if you can Arabic: هَرَّبَ‎ (ar) (harraba) Egyptian Arabic: هرب‎ (harrab) Armenian: please add this translation if you can Basque: please add this translation if you can Bulgarian: контрабандирам (kontrabandiram) Catalan: fer el contraban Chinese: Mandarin: 走私 (zh) (zǒusī) Czech: pašovat (cs) Esperanto: please add this translation if you can Estonian: please add this translation if you can Finnish: salakuljettaa (fi) French: passer en contrebande, contrebander (fr) Galician: contrabandear (gl) Georgian: please add this translation if you can German: schmuggeln (de) Greek: please add this translation if you can Hebrew: הבריח‎ Hungarian: csempészik (hu) Ido: kontrabandar (io) Italian: contrabbandare (it) Japanese: 密輸する (ja) (mitsuyu suru) Khmer: រត់គយ (rŭətkɔɔy) Korean: please add this translation if you can Latvian: please add this translation if you can Lithuanian: please add this translation if you can Macedonian: криу́мчари (kriúmčari), шверцува (švercuva) Maori: kuhu tāhae Mongolian: please add this translation if you can Neapolitan: smercià, cuntrabbandà Norman: faithe la fraude, frauder Norwegian: Bokmål: smugle Polish: przemycać (pl) impf, przemycić (pl) pf Portuguese: contrabandear (pt) Russian: провози́ть контраба́ндой (provozítʹ kontrabándoj) Serbo-Croatian: krijumčariti (sh) Sotho: kunyata Spanish: contrabandear (es), pasar (es) de contrabando (es) m Swedish: smuggla (sv) Thai: ลักลอบ (th) (lák-lɔ̂ɔp) Turkish: please add this translation if you can Ukrainian: робити контрабанду (robyty kontrabandu), провозити контрабандою impf (provozyty kontrabandoju) Vietnamese: buôn lậu (vi)

to bring in surreptitiously

Bulgarian: внасям тайно (vnasjam tajno) German: schmuggeln (de) Hungarian: csempészik (hu)

to thrash or be thrashed by a bear's claws, or to swipe at or be swiped at by a person's arms in a bearlike manner

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

Dutch: smokkelen (nl) Estonian: salakaubana vedama Swedish: smuggla (sv)

Anagrams

• Muggles, muggles