detective

English Online Dictionary. What means detective‎? What does detective mean?

English

Etymology

Ellipsis of detective police.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dɪˈtɛktɪv/
• Rhymes: -ɛktɪv

Noun

detective (plural detectives)

2. (law enforcement) A police officer tasked with collecting evidence and information in order to solve a crime; an investigator.

   Synonym: police detective
3. A person employed to find information not otherwise available to the public.
   • 1887 Dec., Arthur Conan Doyle, "A Study in Scarlet", Beeton's Christmas Annual, pp. 12–3:

     Sherlock Holmes remarked calmly... "Well, I have a trade of my own. I suppose I am the only one in the world. I'm a consulting detective, if you can understand what that means. Here in London we have lots of Government detectives and lots of private ones. When these fellows are at fault they come to me, and I manage to put them on the right scent. They lay all the evidence before me, and I am generally able, by the help of my knowledge of the history of crime, to set them straight. There is a strong family resemblence about misdeeds, and if you have all the details of a thousand at your finger ends, it is odd if you can't unravel the thousand and first."

   • 2013 March 25, David Sedaris, "Long Way Home" in The New Yorker:

     Had they responded this way in France or America, this wouldn't have surprised me, but wasn't everyone in England supposed to be a detective? Wasn't every crime, no matter how complex, solved in a timely fashion by either a professional or a hobbyist? That's the impression you get from British books and TV shows. Sherlock Holmes, Miss Marple, Hetty Wainthropp, Inspector George Gently: they come from every class and corner of the country. There’s even Edith Pargeter's Brother Cadfael, a Benedictine monk who solved crimes in twelfth-century Shrewsbury. No surveillance cameras, no fingerprints, not even a telephone, and still he cracked every case that came his way.

Synonyms

• (law enforcement): DT (abbreviation), Det (abbreviation), Det. (abbreviation)
• (person employed to find information): private detective, private investigator
• (person employed to find information): (slang) dick, private dick, gumshoe
• sleuth

Derived terms

Related terms

Descendants

Translations

Adjective

detective (not comparable)

1. Employed in detecting.

Asturian

Alternative forms

• deteutive

Noun

detective m or f (plural detectives)

1. detective

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from English detective. The sense "work of detective fiction" comes from an ellipsis of detective story.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /deː.tɛkˈti.və/, /deːˈtɛk.tɪf/, /dəˈtɛk.tɪf/
• Hyphenation: de‧tec‧ti‧ve, de‧tec‧tive
• Rhymes: -ivə

Noun

detective m (plural detectives, diminutive detectivetje n or detectiveje n)

1. private detective
2. work of detective fiction, such as a detective novel, film, or series

References

• van der Sijs, Nicoline, editor (2010), “detective”, in Etymologiebank, Meertens Institute

Galician

Noun

detective m (plural detectives)

1. detective

Further reading

• “detective”, in Dicionario da Real Academia Galega (in Galician), A Coruña: Royal Galician Academy, 2012–2024

Italian

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English detective.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /deˈtɛk.tiv/
• Rhymes: -ɛktiv

Noun

detective m or f by sense (invariable)

1. detective

   Synonym: investigatore

References

Further reading

• detective in Treccani.it – Vocabolario Treccani on line, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana

Portuguese

Noun

detective m (plural detectives)

1. Pre-reform spelling (used until 1943 in Brazil and 1990 in Portugal) of detetive. Still used in countries where the agreement hasn't come into effect; may occur as a sporadic misspelling.

Spanish

Etymology

Borrowed from English detective.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /deteɡˈtibe/ [d̪e.t̪eɣ̞ˈt̪i.β̞e]
• Rhymes: -ibe
• Syllabification: de‧tec‧ti‧ve

Noun

detective m or f by sense (plural detectives, feminine detective or detectiva, feminine plural detectives or detectivas)

1. detective

Usage notes

• detective may be masculine or feminine, but the less common detectiva exists for female detectives as well.

Derived terms

Further reading

• “detective”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.7, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 2023 November 28