What does illegitimate mean?
Illegitimate means Not conforming to known principles, or established or accepted rules or standards..
Illegitimate
/ɪlɪˈd͡ʒɪtɪmət/ · adjective
Meaning
Not conforming to known principles, or established or accepted rules or standards..
Definitions by Sense
- Not conforming to known principles, or established or accepted rules or standards.
- Not in accordance with the law.
- Not sanctioned by marriage.
- Not correctly deduced.
- Not authorized by good usage; not genuine.
- (botany) Involving the fertilization of pistils by stamens not of their own length, in heterogonously dimorphic and trimorphic flowers.
- A person born to unmarried parents.
- (transitive) To make illegitimate.
Example Sentences
[…] it may be impossible to convince them that the illegitimate power which they obtain, by degrading themselves, is a curse […]
The so-called interstellar space […] has not the properties of ordinary space. It will not conduct sound, nor can a human being move through it. It is therefore illegitimate to measure it in miles.
Our attitude was that, to put it briefly, our presence there [in South Africa] was legal but illegitimate. We had an abstract right to be there, a birthright, but the basis of that right was fraudulent. Our presence was grounded in a crime, namely colonial conquest, perpetuated by apartheid.
[…] if things went on at this rate it would be doubtful soon whether ever again he would be able to win another election by methods legitimate or illegitimate.
If we credit the scandal of the former [i.e. his enemies], Artaxerxes sprang from the illegitimate commerce of a tanner’s wife with a common soldier.
His illegitimate birth deprived him of the influence of a father until perhaps his fifth year […]
an illegitimate inference
[…] in natural things we must have recourse […] to experience. And all reasoning that is not supported so, ought to be repudiated, or at least suspected to be illegitimate.
Synonyms for illegitimate
Antonyms for illegitimate
Related Words
Word Forms
- more illegitimate
- most illegitimate
- illegitimates
- illegitimating
- illegitimated
Usage Notes
Choose a synonym only when it preserves the intended meaning, tone, and grammar of the full sentence.
Practice and Learn More
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a synonym for illegitimate?
Common synonyms include illegitimate, base, baseborn, base born.
What is the opposite of illegitimate?
Possible antonyms include legitimate, valid, acceptable, allowable.
How do you use illegitimate in a sentence?
[…] it may be impossible to convince them that the illegitimate power which they obtain, by degrading themselves, is a curse […]
Sources & Attribution
FreeDictionaryAPI.com / Wiktionary · Original source · CC BY-SA 4.0
Dictionary data is provided by FreeDictionaryAPI.com and sourced from Wiktionary under its stated license.