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Latin
Etymology
From mendāc- (“lying”, “untruthful”, oblique stem of mendāx) + -ium (nominal suffix).
Pronunciation
Noun
mendācium n (genitive mendāciī or mendācī); second declension
- A lie, untruth, falsehood, fiction.
- Synonym: commentum
8 CE,
Ovid,
Fasti 2.261–262:
- ‘addis’ ait ‘culpae mendācia,’ Phoebus ‘et audēs
fātidicum verbīs fallere velle deum?’- ‘‘So saying, you add lies to your fault?’’ says Phoebus. ‘‘And you dare
wish to deceive the god of prophecy with words?’’
405 CE,
Jerome,
Vulgate Proverbs.10.4:
- quī nītitur mendāciīs hic pāscit ventōs: idem autem ipse sequitur avēs volantēs
- He that trusteth to lies feedeth the winds: and the same runneth after birds that fly away.
(Douay-Rheims trans., Challoner rev.; 1752 CE)
- An illusion, counterfeit.
Declension
Second-declension noun (neuter).
1Found in older Latin (until the Augustan Age).
Quotations
- "Ego numquam pronuntiare mendacium sed ego sum homo indomitus." Braveheart.
Derived terms
Descendants
References
- “mendacium”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- “mendacium”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
- mendacium in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
- Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book, London: Macmillan and Co.
- to tell lies: mendacium dicere