sub rosa
1
9.9
- idiom
- /sʌb ˈroʊzə/
- Formal
:
en secreto
- So all of it is sub Rosa and therefore not easily, you know, controlled by health officials.
Examples
-
There was never supposed to be a "political police" in America, although segments of the FBI have always performed that function sub rosa.
Blog text (30) -
The social worker may even work sub rosa to improve the situation through education, subtle suggestions, or building better working relationships.
Academic text (2007) -
If we are, it is sub rosa.
Blog text (25) -
This sub rosa aid in dying rarely reached the level of public debate.
Academic text (2000) -
Nor can the Court accept various objectors' contention that there is a sub rosa plan.
Blog text (29) -
Sub rosa, I am working for Mrs Doyle's English lawyers, and they suspect Andrew Pennington of... well, of... - Embezzling her money!
-
The unspoken hope of "higher law" defenders seems to be that, somewhere, somehow, higher law will be self-enacting (or administered sub rosa by an elite).
Academic text (1998) -
The committee made their decision sub rosa to avoid public backlash.
-
He shared the plan sub rosa with a few trusted colleagues.
-
The negotiations were conducted sub rosa to keep the details confidential.
Synonyms
56
2.5
In a way other people do not know
33
4.3
Happening in private and away from public view
28
6.0
Most people do not know about it
Happening secretly to keep it private
In secret so only a few people know
Antonyms
How Secret
Surface Forms
Morphology
sub + rosa
The sense 'in secret' is not compositionally derivable from 'sub' (under) + 'rosa' (rose); it is a Latin idiom whose confidentiality sense comes from cultural/historical convention ("under the rose") rather than ordinary semantic combination. Even if a learner knows the constituent meanings, the figurative meaning is unpredictable in English, so it would be opaque to a B1 learner.
Etymology
Sub rosa comes from Latin, where sub means 'under' and rosa means 'rose'. One popular story says people long ago hung a rose above a meeting to show the talk must stay secret, so sub rosa came to mean 'in secret'.