falsehood

American  

[fawls-hood] / ˈfɔls hʊd /

noun

• falsehoods
  plural

1. a false statement; lie.

   Synonyms:

   story, fiction, invention, canard, falsification, prevarication, fabrication

2. something false; an untrue idea, belief, etc..

   The Nazis propagated the falsehood of racial superiority.

3. the act of lying or making false statements.

4. lack of conformity to truth or fact.

   Synonyms:

   mendacity, inveracity, untruthfulness

5. Obsolete. deception.

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falsehood British  

/ ˈfɔːlsˌhʊd /

noun

1. the quality of being untrue

2. an untrue statement; lie

3. the act of deceiving or lying

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Synonym Usage

Falsehood, fib, lie, untruth refer to something untrue or incorrect. A falsehood is a statement that distorts or suppresses the truth, in order to deceive: to tell a falsehood about one's ancestry in order to gain acceptance. A fib denotes a trivial falsehood, and is often used to characterize that which is not strictly true: a polite fib. A lie is a vicious falsehood: to tell a lie about one's neighbor. An untruth is an incorrect statement, either intentionally misleading (less harsh, however, than falsehood or lie) or arising from misunderstanding or ignorance: I'm afraid you are telling an untruth.

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• falsehoods
  plural

Etymology

Origin of falsehood

First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English falsehead, falshede; see origin at false, -hood

Explanation

A falsehood is a lie. If your mom has an uncanny knack for knowing when you're telling a falsehood, it means she always knows when you're stretching the truth. The noun falsehood is a slightly fancy or old-fashioned way of saying "lie." It's hard to ever completely trust a friend again once he's told you a falsehood, although sometimes people tell small falsehoods simply to make others feel better. Telling your aunt her pink hair looks fine is a small falsehood, while lying about your grades on a college application is a pretty big falsehood. The Latin root is falsus, "deceived or erroneous."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

falsehood falsehoods

Writing in The Times, Beard bemoaned that the poem's "erotic puzzles, the teasing ironies, the intriguing questions about truth and falsehood" had been replaced with "a rather ponderous Hollywood message about civilisational decline".

From Barron's ● Jul. 30, 2026

Rather than respond to every claim, Logan says his office picks its battles, intervening only when a falsehood appears likely to reach a wide audience.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 2, 2026

At the very least, the definition of lying must include speaking with the aim of causing one’s audience to adopt a falsehood.

From Salon ● Apr. 13, 2026

In a joint statement with local government officials on Monday, Kaduna state police commissioner Alhaji Muhammad Rabiu described the information as "mere falsehood which is being peddled by conflict entrepreneurs who want to cause chaos".

From BBC ● Jan. 20, 2026

In medical school I have been befriended by an upstart neurologist, who believes I am acting out a great lifelong falsehood.

From "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver

Frances Stonor Saunders’s “The Cultural Cold War” moves beyond outright falsehoods and forgeries to reveal how the Central Intelligence Agency secretly supported a wide-ranging collection of artists and intellectuals between 1947 and 1967.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026

Knowing someone — or of someone — who is gay or lesbian has long tended to dispel falsehoods and quell fears that might exist.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 7, 2026

The falsehoods -- circulating across tech platforms including X, TikTok and Facebook -- have also added fresh fuel to a longstanding conspiracy theory that NASA's 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing was faked.

From Barron's ● Apr. 11, 2026

AI programmes have vastly simplified tasks in the workplace but generative AI systems are known for their ability to "hallucinate" and assert falsehoods as fact, even sometimes inventing sources for the inaccurate information.

From BBC ● Mar. 3, 2026

It is truth they enact, a truth that shames all human falsehoods and deceits.

From "Ophelia" by Lisa Klein

Related Words

• cover-up
• deceit
• deception
• dishonesty
• distortion
• fabrication
• fakery
• fallacy
• falsity
• misstatement
• perjury
• prevarication
• sham
• tall tale
• untruth