Pseudonym

How to spell pseudonym

9 letters · 3 syllables

4 of the 23 people asked to spell pseudonym in Spelling Garden got it wrong the first time.

How to pronounce pseudonym

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does pseudonym mean?

1. nounA fictitious name adopted by a person, especially an author, in place of their real one.

Pseudonym in a sentence

• The novelist published her thrillers under a pseudonym to keep her teaching job private.

• He signed the online forum posts with a pseudonym rather than his legal name.

Where does pseudonym come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word reaches English from the Greek pseudonymos, meaning 'having a false name', which was assembled from pseudes, meaning 'false' or 'lying', and onoma, meaning 'name'. The same pseudo- element survives today in dozens of words such as 'pseudoscience' and 'pseudonymous', always carrying that flavour of something fake or pretended. The -onym half is the very same Greek root for 'name' found in 'synonym', 'antonym', and 'anonymous'. English took the word in the early 1800s, partly through the French pseudonyme, as writers increasingly published under invented names. The spelling trap is almost entirely at the front: the silent opening 'p' and the 'eu' vowel cluster both come straight from the Greek and give no hint in the modern pronunciation, where the word simply begins with an 's' sound.

How the word is built

• pseudo- (false)
• -onym (name, from Greek onoma)