arcane
/ɑɹˈkeɪn/
arcane adjective: understood by only a few.
Adjective
arcane (comparative more arcane, superlative most arcane)
- Understood by only a few.
- arcane rituals
- arcane knowledge
- Obscure, mysterious.
- arcane origins
- arcane details
- Synonyms:
- enigmatic, esoteric, recondite, clandestine
- Requiring secret or mysterious knowledge to understand.
- A “signature” was placed on all things by God to indicate their affinities — but it was hidden, hence the search for arcane knowledge. Knowing was guessing and interpreting, not observing or demonstrating.1997: Chris Horrocks, Introducing Foucault, page 67, The Renaissance Episteme (Totem Books, Icon Books; →ISBN)
- Extremely old (e.g. interpretation or knowledge), and possibly irrelevant.
- an arcane law
arcane meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Malayalam and Persian
arcane in Hindi
- arcane, secret, occult
- गुह्य guhya
arcane in Urdu
- راز, رمز, خُفیَہ, پوشیدَہ, مُبہَم, غَیر واضِع
arcane in Malayalam
- secret, mysterious, covert
- രഹസ്യമായ, പരമരഹസ്യമായ, നിഗൂഢമായ, ദുരൂഹമായ, ഗൂഢാർത്ഥമായ, ഗുപ്തമായ
arcane in Persian
- understood by only a few; obscure
- سری serriyy
Examples of arcane in a sentence
- The professor’s lecture was full of arcane references.
- The manuscript contained arcane symbols no one could decipher.
- He had an arcane knowledge of ancient rituals.
Synonyms of arcane
Antonyms
Forms of arcane
| comparative | more arcane |
|---|---|
| superlative | most arcane |
Origin of arcane
Borrowed from Latin arcānus (“hidden, secret”), from arceō (“to shut up, enclose”); cognate with Latin arca (“a chest”).
Words formed from arcane
Words that rhyme with arcane
48 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- drain
- pane
- gain
- main
- sustain
- vein
- entertain
- skein
- Wayne
- abstain
- bane
- campaign
- champagne
- crane
- entrain
- fain
- insane
- maine
- pain
- plane
- stain
- wane
- Aquitaine
- ascertain
- chicane
- contain
- detain
- explain
- maintain
- mundane
- obtain
- refrain
- remain
- vane
- amain
- Blaine
- complain
- deign
- detrain
- distrain
- kane
- ordain
- pertain
- profane
- public domain
- reign
- swain
- terrain
Questions about arcane
- What does arcane mean?
- Arcane means understood by only a few.
- What is arcane in Hindi?
- Arcane in Hindi is गुह्य (guhya). See Arcane meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use arcane in a sentence?
- The professor’s lecture was full of arcane references.
- What part of speech is arcane?
- Arcane is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce arcane?
- Arcane is pronounced /ɑɹˈkeɪn/ (US).
Words near arcane in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: arcane (page history and authors); गुह्य (Hindi) (page history and authors); arcane (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); arcane (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license). 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.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-arcane.ogg.
Cite this entry: “arcane.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/arcane. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.