adjective
crooked
having or marked by bends or angles; not straight or aligned
Where it comes from
Crooked was formed from the verb crook, to bend, and first described what was curved rather than straight. Its dishonest sense is also medieval, using physical straightness as a model for right conduct.
How the meaning developed
English repeatedly maps geometry onto morality: straight and right suggest correctness, while bent, twisted, and crooked suggest corruption. A crooked official is therefore not named after a shepherd's crook; both senses arise from the more basic idea of bending.
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Sources
Definitions adapted from Open English WordNet where applicable. License and attribution. Word-history text comes from Lexifour’s sourced social research; pages are assembled automatically, not individually fact-checked on every update.
Updated 2026-09-30. Report a correction.