Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Pseudepigrapha

pseud-e-pi-graph-a (sd-pgr-f)

noun pl.
1. Spurious writings, especially writings falsely attributed to biblical characters or times.
Many old religious texts, outside of any particular religion's canon, are just pseudepigraphia. In secular, literary texts, scholars usually just apply the prefix "pseudo" to describe the text, as with all of the early twentieth-century pseudo-Oscar Wilde homosexual porn that Robert Ross fought so hard to get off the market.

2. A body of texts written between 200 b.c. and a.d. 200 and spuriously ascribed to various prophets and kings of Hebrew Scriptures.
When Derek's friend claimed to have never heard of any pseudepigrapha, Derek asked if she had ever heard of the bible.

Synonyms: apocryphal, pseudological.