PRIVY • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Privy

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/prˈɪvi/ Listen

adjective

Privy adj.

1.

Of or pertaining to some person exclusively; assigned to private uses; not public; private; as, the privy purse. " Privee knights and squires."

2.

Secret; clandestine. " A privee thief."

3.

Appropriated to retirement; private; not open to the public. " Privy chambers."

4.

Admitted to knowledge of a secret transaction; secretly cognizant; privately knowing. "His wife also being privy to it." "Myself am one made privy to the plot."

Privy chamber, a private apartment in a royal residence. (Eng.)

Privy council (Eng. Law), the principal council of the sovereign, composed of the cabinet ministers and other persons chosen by the king or queen.

Privy councilor, a member of the privy council.

Privy purse, moneys set apart for the personal use of the monarch; also, the title of the person having charge of these moneys. (Eng.)

Privy seal or Privy signet, the seal which the king uses in grants, etc., which are to pass the great seal, or which he uses in matters of subordinate consequence which do not require the great seal; also, elliptically, the principal secretary of state, or person intrusted with the privy seal. (Eng.)

Privy verdict, a verdict given privily to the judge out of court; now disused.

noun

Privy n. (pl. privies)

1.

(Law) A partaker; a person having an interest in any action or thing; one who has an interest in an estate created by another; a person having an interest derived from a contract or conveyance to which he is not himself a party. The term, in its proper sense, is distinguished from party.

2.

A necessary house or place for performing excretory functions in private; an outhouse; a backhouse.

See images of 'Privy'

Etymology of 'Privy'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Privy" Quotes from Famous Books

... raged in the hall. The Jacobins resolved to destroy Madame Roland, whose courage had prompted this attack upon them, and for which she had become the object of their intensest hate. They suborned an adventurer named Viard to accuse her of being privy to a correspondence with the English Government for the purpose of saving the life of the king. She was summoned before the assembly to confront her accuser. She appeared in the midst of her enemies, armed ...

— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller

... cheerful smiles on the countenances of all present; in others they talked about the news relating to courts, to public ministers, and state policy, and to various matters which had transpired from privy councils, interspersing many conjectures and reasonings of their own respecting the issues of such councils; in others again they conversed about trade and merchandise; in others upon subjects of literature; in others upon points of civil prudence and morals; and in others ...

— The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love • Emanuel Swedenborg

... piece of paper," continued the Prince, leading him towards the table; "and let me recommend you, when you are again in Paris, to avoid the society of that dangerous man. He has acted in this matter on a generous inspiration; that I must believe; had he been privy to young Geraldine's death he would never have despatched the body to the care ...

— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson

... of the Lady Arabella became known, and sent its shaft of terror to the heart of King James. The woman was at it again, wanting to marry; she must be dealt with. She and Seymour were summoned before the privy council and sharply questioned. Seymour was harshly censured. How dared he presume to seek an alliance with one of royal blood, he was asked, in blind disregard of the fact that royal blood ...

— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... British officials that the added expense required by the act imposed an undue hardship on the tobacco trade. This local opposition combined with the pressure of the conservative London merchants caused the act to be vetoed by the Privy Council ...

— Tobacco in Colonial Virginia - "The Sovereign Remedy" • Melvin Herndon

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