mendax

Derived from Proto-Indo-European *mend- (“to fault”), whence also mendum and menda, plus -āx. Original meaning was "faulty" and was shifted towards "deceitful" under the influence of mentior (“I lie”).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈmɛn.daːks]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈmɛn.daks]

mendāx (genitive mendācis, comparative mendācior, superlative mendācissimus, adverb mendāciter); third-declension one-termination adjective

1. deceitful, lying, deceptive, untruthful, false, mendacious, feigned, not real.

Note that mendāce is an alternative form for the ablative singular mendācī

Third-declension one-termination adjective.

• (false, lying): dēceptōrius, fallāx, falsus, levis

• (antonym(s) of “false, untruthful”): sincērus, vērāx, vēridicus, vērus

• mendācitās
• mendāciter
• mendācium

• mendāciloquium
• mendāciloquus
• mendāciunculum

• → English: mendacious
• Italian: mendace
• Portuguese: mendace, mendaz
• Spanish: mendaz

mendāx m (genitive mendācis); third declension

1. liar

Third-declension noun.

• vērāx

• “mendax”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “mendax”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891), An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “mendax”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Julius Pokorny (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, in 3 vols, Bern, München: Francke Verlag