Word.ws English Dictionary

accessary before the fact

accessary before the fact is the alternative spelling of accessory before the fact.

Meaning of accessory before the fact

Noun

accessory before the fact (plural accessories before the fact)

  1. One who commands or counsels an actionable offense, not being present at its commission.
    • 'In a sort of way I suppose I am an accessory before the fact,' he remarked with some complacency. 'At least, I knew that they were up to some special brand of devilment from Moya's hints and general air of mystery and triumph. Began about last Friday.'1927, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], Max Carrados Mysteries

Forms of accessary before the fact

pluralaccessaries before the fact

Questions about accessary before the fact

What is accessary before the fact the alternative spelling of?
Accessary before the fact is the alternative spelling of accessory before the fact.

Words near accessary before the fact in the dictionary

  1. accessaries before the fact
  2. accessarily
  3. accessariness
  4. accessary
  5. accessary after the fact
  6. accessary before the fact
  7. accessaryship
  8. accessed
  9. accesses
  10. accessibilities
  11. accessibility

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: accessary before the fact (page history and authors); accessory before the fact (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “accessary before the fact.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/accessary_before_the_fact. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.