fallax

From Latin fallax (“deceptive”). See fallacy.

• IPA^(key): /ˈfæləks/

fallax (plural fallaxes)

1. (obsolete) cavillation; petty criticism
   • a. 1556, Thomas Cranmer, An Answer to a Crafty and Sophistical Cavillation devised by Stephen Gadiner

     First, after the sum of my fourth book, collected as pleaseth you, at the first dash you begin with an untrue report, joined to a subtle deceit or fallax, saying that my chief purpose that evil men receive not the body and blood of Christ in the sacrament.

fallax in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913

From fallō (“I deceive”) +‎ -āx (“inclined to”).

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈfal.laːks/, [ˈfälːʲäːks̠]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈfal.laks/, [ˈfälːäks]

fallāx (genitive fallācis, comparative fallācior, superlative fallācissimus, adverb fallāciter); third-declension one-termination adjective

1. deceptive, deceitful
   • 405 CE, Jerome, Vulgate Proverbs 26:28:

     Lingua fallāx nōn amat vēritātem: et os lūbricum operātur ruīnās. [adjective]

     A deceitful tongue loveth not truth: and a slippery mouth worketh ruin.
     (Douay-Rheims trans., Challoner rev.: 1752 CE)

2. fallacious, spurious

Third-declension one-termination adjective.

• Catalan: fal·laç
• Galician: falaz
• Italian: fallace
• Portuguese: falaz
• Spanish: falaz
• English: fallacy

• “fallax”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “fallax”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• fallax in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette
• Carl Meißner; Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎, London: Macmillan and Co.
  • a fallacious argument; sophism: conclusiuncula fallax or captio