mendacity

noun

men·​dac·​i·​ty men-ˈda-sə-tē 

plural mendacities

1

: the quality or state of being mendacious

… to blow the whistle on mendacity and hypocrisy.

—Geoffrey Wolff

2

: lie

mendacities of the singer's manager

Synonyms of mendacity

• lie
• tale
• story

Examples of mendacity in a Sentence

highly fictionalized “memoirs” in which the facts were few and the mendacities many

you need to overcome this deplorable mendacity, or no one will ever believe anything you say

Recent Examples on the Web

Viewed from an especially merciless or purgatorial angle, certain strands of my life are little more than histories of lo-fi mendacity. —James Parker, The Atlantic, 28 Oct. 2025

But one finishes this family saga more fully understanding why, for Xi Jinping, opacity and mendacity became the best guarantors of survival. —Foreign Affairs, 20 Oct. 2025

By promoting dissimulation and sanctifying mendacity, Trump’s tsarist regime works to silence knowledge. —Sun Sentinel Editorial Board, Sun Sentinel, 8 Apr. 2025

Biden’s half-century political career is littered with mendacity, self-dealing, and crass calculations. —The Editors, National Review, 2 Dec. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

circa 1540, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for mendacity

• audacity
• capacity
• loquacity
• opacity
• pugnacity
• rapacity
• sagacity
• tenacity
• veracity
• vivacity
• voracity
• incapacity