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# subtle

«subtle» in Mova's early modern english dictionary: **crafty** — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 3 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

### kind

archaic sense

### modern equivalent

crafty

### part of speech

adjective

### meaning for a pupil

Clever in a sly, tricky way, able to fool others without them noticing. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/S/subtle/#m1)

### how it differs from today

Today "subtle" means small, delicate or hard to notice. The first sentence uses the old sense of sly cleverness; the second and third use today's sense.

### examples

- Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. (Torah GEN.3.1, JPS 1917) [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/S/subtle/#x1)
- The subtle characterisation of the various occupations reaches a high level of artistic merit. (More English Fairy Tales) [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/S/subtle/#x2)
- Was it not rather that he should not henceforth see Burd Janet?--a subtle touch of jealousy. (More English Fairy Tales) [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/S/subtle/#x3)

### primary record

subtle

### tests

manual 10.3; corpora 8 (Torah 1, tales 7, Sefer Yetzirah 0); EWT 3; ratio 0.1 (Torah alone 0.3); Wiktionary no archaic label

### In the corpora

- [Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/jps/GEN.60/)
- [With the pure Thou dost show myself pure; and with the crooked Thou dost show Thyself subtle.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/jps/2SA.686/)
- [With the pure Thou dost show Thyself pure; and with the crooked Thou dost show Thyself subtle.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/jps/PSA.237/)

### Trees and pragmatics

[Every meaning and example of «subtle» parsed by Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/S/subtle/), each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.