the act of debasing, by an improper mixture, something that was pure and genuine. The word is Latin, formed of the verb, adulterare, to corrupt, by mingling something foreign to any substance.

ADULTERATION of Coin properly imports the making or casting of a wrong metal, or with too base or too much alloy. Alterations of coins are effected divers ways: as, by forging another stamp or inscription; by mixing impure metals with the gold or silver; by making use of a wrong metal, or an undue alloy, or too great an admixture of the baser metals with gold or silver. Counterfeiting the stamp, or clipping and lessening the weight, does not so properly come under the denomination of adulterating. This term is somewhat less extensive than debasing, which includes diminishing, clipping, &c. To adulterate or debase the current coin is a capital crime in all nations. The ancients punished it with great severity. Among the Egyptians both hands were cut off, and by the civil law the offender was thrown to wild beasts. The emperor Adrian Tacitus enacted, that counterfeiting the coin should be capital; and under Constantine it was made treason, as it is also among us.