Not legitimate; bastard: as, spurious issue.Not proceeding from the true source or from the source pretended; not being what it pretends or appears to be; not genuine; counterfeit; false; adulterated.In zoology:False; resembling a part or organ, but not having its function: as, spurious eyes or limbs.Having the functions of an organ, but morphologically different from it: as, the spurious legs, or prolegs, of a caterpillar.Aborted or changed so that the normal functions no longer exist: as, the spurious or aborted front legs of certain butterflies.Erroneous; incorrectly established: as, a spurious genus or species. See pseudogenus.In botany, false; counterfeit; apparent only.Synonyms Spurious, Supposititious, and Counterfeit agree in expressing intent to deceive, except that counterfeit may be used with figurative lightness where no dishonorable purpose is implied. Spurious, not genuine, expresses strong disapprobation of the deception, successful or attempted. Supposititious applies only to that which is substituted for the genuine; it thus expresses a class under the spurious: a supposititious work of Athanasius is not one that is supposed to have been written by him, but one that is palmed off upon the public as being the genuine text of a work that he is known to have written; a supposititious child is a changeling; was the Tichborne claimant the genuine or a supposititious Sir Roger? Counterfeit applies also to a class under the spurious—namely, to that which is made in attempted imitation of something else: as, a counterfeit coin, bank-note, signature. Chatterton's manuscripts were spurious, but not supposititious; as they were not exact imitations of any particular manuscripts of early days, they would hardly be called counterfeit. See factitious.