artfulness

noun

Definition of artfulnessnext
1
as in cunning
skill in achieving one's ends through indirect, subtle, or underhanded means with well-practiced artfulness, he convinced his mother he was sick enough to stay home from school but not sick enough for a visit to the doctor's office

Synonyms & Similar Words

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2
as in skill
subtle or imaginative ability in inventing, devising, or executing something building a ship model requires a painstaking artfulness I don't have

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

Examples Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for artfulness
  1. cunning
  2. skill
  3. subtlety
Noun
  • There’s an unapologetic cunning at the heart of this series, and a mercurial spirit that’s as slippery as blood on an Italian marble floor.
    Roxana Hadadi, Vulture, 4 Apr. 2024
  • Just as Nordlinger shows that the peacemakers and Nobel laureates whose work holds up best are those who brought specific conflicts to an end, the organizations in Bob's account that get the most done are those that pursue limited goals with cunning and patience.
    Walter Russell Mead, Foreign Affairs, 1 Nov. 2012
Definition of cunning
Noun
  • Having a boss who lacks communication skills is difficult.
    Ashton Jackson, CNBC, 8 Jan. 2025
  • Asking Scholarly Questions with JSTOR Daily Help students develop analytic and scholarly questioning skills using a quick activity built on JSTOR Daily roundups and syllabi.
    JSTOR Daily, JSTOR Daily, 8 Jan. 2025
Definition of skill
Noun
  • The intricate subtleties and emotional expressiveness of the film’s lions were pushed to new levels.
    Bill Desowitz, IndieWire, 13 Jan. 2025
  • This was a crystallizing moment in my teaching career: what afflicts literature, more than book banning, is this rapid loss of the ability to read for deeper meanings, to grasp subtlety, and to understand ambiguity.
    Yiyun Li, Harper's Magazine, 2 Nov. 2024
Definition of subtlety
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Thesaurus Entries Near artfulness

artfully

artfulness

art house

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Cite this Entry

“Artfulness.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/artfulness. Accessed 20 Jan. 2025.

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