Word.ws English Dictionary

speciously

/ˈspiːʃəsli/

speciously adverb: in a specious manner; fallaciously and erroneously, but seeming superficially to be correct.

Adverb (1)

speciously (comparative more speciously, superlative most speciously)

  1. In a specious manner; fallaciously and erroneously, but seeming superficially to be correct.
    • Exasperated, as he might speciously allege, by the injuries of a similar nature, he hastened with a few followers to join the standard, and to betray the confidence, of his too credulous friend.1781, Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, volume II, London: […] W[illiam] Strahan; and T[homas] Cadell, […], →OCLC
    • And thus his jealous soul speciously argued to excuse the separation of father and child.1886 May, Thomas Hardy, The Mayor of Casterbridge: The Life and Death of a Man of Character. […], volume II, London: Smith, Elder & Co., […], →OCLC

Adverb (2)

speciously (comparative more speciously, superlative most speciously)

  1. (malapropism) Specially.
    • I will do what I can for them all three, for so I haue promisd, and Ile bee as good as my word, but speciously for M. Fenton.c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...

Forms of speciously

comparativemore speciously
superlativemost speciously

Origin of speciously

From specious + -ly.

Alteration of specially, perhaps by association with specious.

Questions about speciously

What does speciously mean?
Speciously means in a specious manner; fallaciously and erroneously, but seeming superficially to be correct.
What part of speech is speciously?
Speciously is an adverb.
How do you pronounce speciously?
Speciously is pronounced /ˈspiːʃəsli/.

Words near speciously in the dictionary

  1. speciose
  2. speciosities
  3. speciosity
  4. specious
  5. specious present
  6. speciously
  7. speciousness
  8. speciousnesses
  9. SPECIs
  10. specism
  11. specist

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: speciously (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “speciously.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/speciously. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.