adulterate
to debase or make impure by adding inferior materials or elements; use cheaper, inferior, or less desirable goods in the production of (any professedly genuine article): to adulterate food.
impure or debased; cheapened in quality or purity.
Origin of adulterate
1Other words from adulterate
- a·dul·ter·a·tor, noun
- un·a·dul·ter·ate, adjective
Words that may be confused with adulterate
- adulterer, adulterate
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use adulterate in a sentence
Deeming it to be “adulterated and misbranded,” they dyed the milk blue.
Wisconsin Farmer to Stand Trial for Selling Raw Milk | Sarah Begley | May 12, 2013 | THE DAILY BEASTFormerly, when a commodity was adulterated, it could be returned, and the courts became sorely troubled to defend an adulteration.
Putnam's Handy Law Book for the Layman | Albert Sidney BollesIt is to be observed that with the exception of Burgred's coins and a few anonymous pieces the silver was never adulterated.
The inferior kinds of smalt are occasionally adulterated with chalk.
Field's Chromatography | George FieldIt is often largely adulterated with chalk and sulphate of copper.
Field's Chromatography | George Field
Flour and other cereal foods are sometimes adulterated with some cheap substitutes, as bran or sawdust.
A Civic Biology | George William Hunter
British Dictionary definitions for adulterate
(tr) to debase by adding inferior material: to adulterate milk with water
Origin of adulterate
1Derived forms of adulterate
- adulteration, noun
- adulterator, noun
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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