palter
/ˈpɔl.tɚ/verb
palter is a verb meaning “To talk insincerely; to prevaricate or equivocate in speech or actions” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled P-A-L-T-E-R and has 2 syllables, and it appears about once in every 39 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).
What does palter mean?
verb
- 1
To talk insincerely; to prevaricate or equivocate in speech or actions.
- 2
To give a false impression by selective use of true but misleading statements.
- 3
archaicTo trifle.
- 4
To haggle.
- 5
To babble; to chatter.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce palter?
- UK /ˈpɒltə/
- UK /ˈpɔːltə/
- US /ˈpɔl.tɚ/
Palter has 2 syllables (counted from the pronunciation).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Naomi_Persephone_Amethyst_(NaomiAmethyst)-palter.wav, LL-Q1860_(eng)-AcpoKrane-palter.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of palter
- palters present, singular, he/she/it
- paltering participle, present
- paltered participle, past
- paulter
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is palter?
Palter appears about once in every 39 million words in written English, the 191,932nd most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Palter in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense to talk insincerely:
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does palter come from?
Probably from Middle English *palter (“rag, trifle, worthless thing”), from Middle Low German palter (“rag, cloth”). More at paltry.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).