A.Word.A.Day --pseudologue

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Nov 2, 2026

This week’s theme
Words to describe people

This week’s words
pseudologue

Calumny of Apelles, 1494-95
Fraud and Deceit adorn Calumny’s hair while Truth, on the far left, stands ignored.

Art: Sandro Botticelli
See also: Truth Coming Out of Her Well

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Eponyms from antiquity

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A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

In Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well, one character describes another:

...he’s a most notable coward, an infinite and endless liar, an hourly promise-breaker, the owner of no one good quality...

Fortunately, the play is more than 400 years old. And it’s fiction. I can’t think of anyone today who fits that description.

For our sake and the sake of the rest of the world, let’s hope tomorrow’s US elections end well.

Meanwhile, this week we’ll feature five words to describe people. Surely, no one person could qualify for all five. Can you think of any?

pseudologue

PRONUNCIATION:

(SOO/SYOO-duh-log)

MEANING:

noun: A habitual liar.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Greek pseudo- (false) + logos (word, speech). Earliest documented use: 1949.

NOTES:

Some people stretch the truth. A pseudologue gives it a whole exercise program.

USAGE:

“For each pseudologue, the internal motive is different (and often hard to determine because of the obvious difficulty of ascertaining an honest family history).”
Shiv Malik; The Messenger; Faber & Faber; 2019.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

If the truth doesn't serve us, what does that say about us? -Lois McMaster Bujold, author (b. 2 Nov 1949)

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