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
Geoffrey Wolff2
: lie
mendacities of the singer's manager
Synonyms
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
Morris has made a career out of finding truth in the apocryphal, in cutting through layers of delusion and mendacity or at least bringing the artificiality of those layers to the surface.
—Daniel Fienberg, The Hollywood Reporter, 1 Sep. 2023
Biden has developed a series of verbal tics that tend to either precede or follow some of his more flagrant mendacities.
—Noah Rothman, National Review, 15 Sep. 2023
Spreading Trump’s corrosive lies — or, at the least, enabling his mendacity by failing to call him out— is no typical infraction, like blithely promising a balanced budget or overstating the benefits of reforming the healthcare system.
—Mark Z. Barabak, Los Angeles Times, 27 July 2023
In all seriousness, this kind of mendacity tends to catch up to a person.
—Roxane Gay, New York Times, 1 Sep. 2023
The event is being characterized in some quarters as a generational struggle, as a fifty-four-year-old upstart seeks to wrest the crown of mendacity from an aging but still dangerous seventy-seven-year-old.
—Andy Borowitz, The New Yorker, 21 Aug. 2023
The finding might mean that regular liars are predisposed to mendacity due to their unusual brain structure (nature, egg) or that the structure developed through practice (nurture, chicken).
—Paul Tullis, Town & Country, 30 Apr. 2023
Though Hollywood lies about our ability to detect lies, psychologists and experienced police interrogators can catch mendacity only slightly better than chance would predict, and hardly better than the rest of us.
—Paul Tullis, Town & Country, 30 Apr. 2023
If journalism is really about truth, there is nothing newsworthy about giving free airtime to the prime minister of mendacity.
—Roxane Gay, Fortune, 13 May 2023
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Daniel Fienberg, The Hollywood Reporter, 1 Sep. 2023
Biden has developed a series of verbal tics that tend to either precede or follow some of his more flagrant mendacities.
—Noah Rothman, National Review, 15 Sep. 2023
Spreading Trump’s corrosive lies — or, at the least, enabling his mendacity by failing to call him out— is no typical infraction, like blithely promising a balanced budget or overstating the benefits of reforming the healthcare system.
—Mark Z. Barabak, Los Angeles Times, 27 July 2023
In all seriousness, this kind of mendacity tends to catch up to a person.
—Roxane Gay, New York Times, 1 Sep. 2023
The event is being characterized in some quarters as a generational struggle, as a fifty-four-year-old upstart seeks to wrest the crown of mendacity from an aging but still dangerous seventy-seven-year-old.
—Andy Borowitz, The New Yorker, 21 Aug. 2023
The finding might mean that regular liars are predisposed to mendacity due to their unusual brain structure (nature, egg) or that the structure developed through practice (nurture, chicken).
—Paul Tullis, Town & Country, 30 Apr. 2023
Though Hollywood lies about our ability to detect lies, psychologists and experienced police interrogators can catch mendacity only slightly better than chance would predict, and hardly better than the rest of us.
—Paul Tullis, Town & Country, 30 Apr. 2023
If journalism is really about truth, there is nothing newsworthy about giving free airtime to the prime minister of mendacity.
—Roxane Gay, Fortune, 13 May 2023
See More
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'mendacity.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Word History
First Known Use
circa 1540, in the meaning defined at sense 1
Dictionary Entries Near mendacity
Cite this Entry
“Mendacity.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/mendacity. Accessed 4 Oct. 2023.
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More from Merriam-Webster on mendacity
Britannica English: Translation of mendacity for Arabic Speakers
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