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bogus

 - 4 dictionary results

bo⋅gus

[boh-guhs]
–adjective
1. not genuine; counterfeit; spurious; sham.
–noun
2. Printing, Journalism. matter set, by union requirement, by a compositor and later discarded, duplicating the text of an advertisement for which a plate has been supplied or type set by another publisher.

Origin:
1825–30, Americanism; orig. an apparatus for coining false money; perh. akin to bogy 1


1. fraudulent, pseudo, fake, phony.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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bo·gus   (bō'gəs)   
adj.  Counterfeit or fake; not genuine: bogus money; bogus tasks.

[From obsolete bogus, a device for making counterfeit money.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Slang Dictionary
bogus [ˈbogəs]

  1. mod.
    phony; false; undesirable. : This class is really bogus.
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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Word Origin & History

bogus 
"counterfeit money," 1839, Amer.Eng., apparently from a slang word applied in Ohio in 1827 to a counterfeiter's apparatus. Some trace this to tantrabobus, a late 18c. colloquial Vermont word for any odd-looking object, which may be connected to tantarabobs, recorded as a Devonshire name for the devil. Others trace it to the same source as bogey.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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