falsehood, lie, deceive, pretend, counterfeit, forgery
偽 centers on intentional deception: presenting something false as true, whether through lying, pretending, or creating a counterfeit. The meanings all share the idea of a deliberate misrepresentation.
偽 combines 亻 (person) with 為, which historically relates to doing or making. The compound suggests a person making something that is not genuine, i.e., falsifying. The exact phonetic role of 為 is uncertain, but the semantic link to human action is clear.
A person 亻 beside 為 (which looks like a hand guiding an elephant in some interpretations, but here just think of it as 'doing'). Imagine a person doing something sneaky—crafting a fake object or telling a lie—so 偽 means falsehood.
For ギ, picture a person wearing a disguise with a big fake **gear** on their shoulder: gear -> ギ, and the gear is part of the counterfeit costume.
imitation; fake; phony; counterfeit; forged; bogus; sham
spurious article; forgery; counterfeit; imitation; sham
camouflage; disguise
forgery; counterfeiting; fabrication; falsification
lie; falsehood; fiction; fabrication
falsehood; untruth; lie; misinformation
hypocrisy
to lie; to pretend; to feign; to falsify
false name; alias; assumed name; pseudonym
truth or falsehood; genuineness; authenticity; veracity
impostor; imposter; pretender; liar
false evidence; perjury; false testimony
counterfeit bill; counterfeit note
counterfeit (paper) money; counterfeit bill; counterfeit note
crime of perjury
deceptive plan
placebo
spurious letter; apocryphal book; forgery
apocryphal work; forgery; spurious article
Tanzanian bay owl (Phodilus prigoginei); Congo bay owl