Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Knowledge that one's actions are wrong or contrary to law, where such knowledge is an element of a criminal offense or a basis for liability.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In law, the clause in a complaint or indictment charging that, the defendant has knowledge which renders him responsible or guilty; also, the fact that the defendant has such knowledge.
  • In law, knowingly; wilfully.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adverb (Law) Knowingly; willfully.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adverb law deliberately, knowingly
  • noun law knowledge of one's own illegal acts; intent

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adverb (law) deliberately or knowingly

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin, knowingly, consciously, from sciēns, scient-, present participle of scīre, to know; see science.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin scienter ("knowingly"), from sciō ("know").

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word scienter.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.