embase

• imbase (obsolete)

From em- +‎ base. Compare Old French embaissier.

• IPA^(key): /ɪmˈbeɪs/

embase (third-person singular simple present embases, present participle embasing, simple past and past participle embased)

1. (obsolete, transitive) To lower physically.
   • 1608, [Guillaume de Salluste] Du Bartas, “(please specify the page)”, in Josuah Sylvester, transl., Du Bartas His Deuine Weekes and Workes , 3rd edition, London: Humfrey Lownes ], published 1611, →OCLC:

     [God had] Embast the valleys, and embost the hills.

2. (archaic, transitive) To bring down or lower in position, status, etc.; to degrade, humiliate.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. , London: [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

     And either vowd with all their power and witt
     To let not others honour be defaste
     Of friend or foe, who ever it embaste […]

   • 1692–1717, Robert South, Twelve Sermons Preached upon Several Occasions, volumes (please specify |volume=I to VI), London:

     Such pitiful embellishments of speech as serve for nothing but to embase divinity.

3. (archaic, transitive) To lower the value of (a coin, commodity etc.); to debase (a coin) with alloy.
   • 1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Truth”, in The Essayes , 3rd edition, London: Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC:

     Alloy in coin of gold […] may make the metal work the better, but it embaseth it.

• Beames, Mabees, bamsee, beames

• Hyphenation: em‧ba‧se
• Rhymes: -azi, -azɨ

embase

1. inflection of embasar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative

embase

1. only used in me embase, first-person singular present subjunctive of embasarse
2. only used in se embase, third-person singular present subjunctive of embasarse
3. only used in se ... embase, syntactic variant of embásese, third-person singular imperative of embasarse