overt

Open and not concealed or secret.

Adjective

  1. Open and not concealed or secret.
    • The buſineſs of Overt-Acts is, where the Compaſſing and Imagining the King's Death is the Crime and Queſtion, and this muſt be diſcover'd by Overt-Acts. But if the Treaſon be falſifying of the King's Money, this is...
    • [T]he essence of a sale in a market overt is, that the goods should be openly exposed in the ordinary way, and also that the whole transaction should take place there, and at one time. If a man make a contract for...
    • Students receive hidden messages from their participation in classroom activites, by attending school and by virtue of the context of school in society. [...] Educators have argued that children should, for example,...

    Synonyms: manifest open patent plain unconcealed

    Antonyms: covert hidden nonovert abstruse behind the scenes catlike backroom stealth clandestine cloak-and-dagger concealed confidential deep-laid dern disguised furtive huggermugger hush-hush inconspicuous incognito low profile lurksome lurky mousy

  2. Disclosed.
    • Arg. an eagle rising wings overt inverted sa. armed or. HILTOFTE, V. - 1874, John Woody Papworth, An Alphabetical Dictionary of Coats of Arms Belonging to Families in Great Britain and Ireland, page 298:

Origin

From Middle English overt, uverte (“open, uncovered; unfastened; accessible, unobstructed; clear, manifest”), from Anglo-Norman overt, Middle French ouvert, Old French overt, ouvert, uvert (“opened”) (modern French ouvert), past participle of Anglo-Norman, Old French ovrir, ouvrir, uvrir (“to open”), from Late Latin operire, variant of Latin aperīre (“to open”), from aperiō (“to open, uncover”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂epó (“away; from”) + *h₂wer- (“to cover, shut”). The English word is a doublet of apert and ouvert.

Antonyms

covert

Related

overture

Derived

market overt nonovert overtly overtness overt prestige pound overt semiovert unovert

Noun

  1. An action or condition said to be detrimental to one’s own survival and thus unethical; the consciousness of such behaviour.
    • Scientologists are sure that the person must have “overts” against Scientology, therefore nothing a former member says can be trusted. - 1990, Jon Atack, A Piece of Blue Sky: Scientology, Dianetics and L. Ron Hubbard...
    • Masturbation is an overt—strictly forbidden in Scientology, as Hubbard believed that it can slow one’s process to enlightenment. - 2006 February 23, Janet Reitman, “Inside Scientology”, in Rolling Stone:
    • Anyone who leaves has committed “overts” (harmful acts) against the church and is withholding them. The church is obligated to make such people come clean, Hubbard said, because withholding overts against Scientology...

Forms

overts

Derived

O/W