bogus

[boh-guhs]

See more synonyms for bogus on Thesaurus.com

adjective

not genuine; counterfeit; spurious; sham.

noun

Printing, Journalism. matter set, by union requirement, by a compositor and later discarded, duplicating the text of an advertisement for which a plate has been supplied or type set by another publisher.

Origin of bogus

1825–30, Americanism; originally an apparatus for coining false money; perhaps akin to bogy¹

Synonyms for bogus

See more synonyms for on Thesaurus.com

1. fraudulent, pseudo, fake, phony.

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Related Words for bogus

spurious, phony, fraudulent, fictitious, forged, fake, sham, false, artificial, dummy, ersatz, imitation, pretended, pseudo, simulated

Examples from the Web for bogus

Contemporary Examples of bogus

The man, Joshua Kemp, told what police describe as “a bogus story that quickly fell apart.”
Shot Down During the NYPD Slowdown
Michael Daly
January 7, 2015
With a nose for bogus facts, Johnson sets out to break the Internet by breaking news.
On Torture, Chuck Johnson & Sondheim
James Poulos
December 13, 2014
Rich Lowry, editor of the conservative National Review, called that statistic “bogus.”
Fact-Checking the Sunday Shows: Dec. 7
PunditFact.com
December 7, 2014
He opens up about the bogus Midnight Express, Oliver Stone on blow, and his riveting one-man show.
The Unbelievable (True) Story of the World’s Most Infamous Hash Smuggler
Marlow Stern
November 14, 2014
What do they do if they find out there are these bogus parts that can come unscrewed?
Patients Screwed in Spine Surgery ‘Scam’
The Center for Investigative Reporting
November 3, 2014

Historical Examples of bogus

Save for subsiding bubbles, and the bogus water, there was nothing there.
The Paliser case
Edgar Saltus
In all such cases the heraldry should be true, and not of the "bogus" kind.
Wood-Carving
George Jack
She must explain to me how that bogus money came into her possession.
Frank Merriwell's Bravery
Burt L. Standish
By some fearful mischance I dropped a real despatch and not the bogus one.
The Lost Despatch
Natalie Sumner Lincoln
Wall, I must say I like yer looks a heap better nor I did the bogus one!
Dave Porter in the Gold Fields
Edward Stratemeyer

British Dictionary definitions for bogus

bogus

adjective

spurious or counterfeit; not genuinea bogus note

Derived Formsbogusly, adverbbogusness, noun

Word Origin for bogus

C19: from bogus apparatus for making counterfeit money; perhaps related to bogey 1

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for bogus

1838, "counterfeit money, spurious coin," American English, apparently from a slang word applied (according to some sources first in Ohio in 1827) to a counterfeiter's apparatus.

One bogus or machine impressing dies on the coin, with a number of dies, engraving tools, bank bill paper, spurious coin, &c. &c. making in all a large wagon load, was taken into possession by the attorney general of Lower Canada. [Niles' Register, Sept. 7, 1833, quoting from Concord, New Hampshire, "Statesman," Aug. 24]

Some trace this to tantrabobus, also tantrabogus, a late 18c. colloquial Vermont word for any odd-looking object, in later 19c. use "the devil," which might be connected to tantarabobs, recorded as a Devonshire name for the devil. Others trace it to the same source as bogey (n.1).