Category:Coin

Coin (koin), n. Etym: [F. coin, formerly also coing, wedge, stamp, corner, fr. L. cuneus wedge; prob. akin to E. cone, hone. See Hone, n., and cf. Coigne, Quoin, Cuneiform.]

1. A quoin; a corner or external angle; a wegde. See Coigne, and Quoin.

2. A piece of metal on which certain characters are stamped by government authority, making it legally current as money; -- much used in a collective sense. It is alleged that it [a subsidy] exceeded all the current coin of the realm. Hallam.

3. That which serves for payment or recompense. The loss of present advantage to flesh and blood is repaid in a nobler coin. Hammond. Coin balance. See Illust. of Balance. -- To pay one in his own coin, to return to one the same kind of injury or ill treatment as has been received from him. [Colloq.]

coin Coin, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Coined (koind); p. pr. & vb. n. Coining.]

1. To make of a definite fineness, and convert into coins, as a mass of metal; to mint; to manufacture; as, to coin silver dollars; to coin a medal.

2. To make or fabricate; to invent; to originate; as, to coin a word. Some tale, some new pretense, he daily coined, To soothe his sister and delude her mind. Dryden.

3. To acquire rapidly, as money; to make. Tenants cannot coin rent just at quarter day. Locke.

coin Coin, v. i.

Defn: To manufacture counterfeit money. They cannot touch me for coining. Shak.

- ---excerpt from the Illustrated Bible Dictionary

Coin - Before the Exile the Jews had no regularly stamped money. They made use of uncoined shekels or talents of silver, which they weighed out (Genesis 23:16; Exodus 38:24; 2 Samuel 18:12). Probably the silver ingots used in the time of Abraham may have been of a fixed weight, which was in some way indicated on them. The "pieces of silver" paid by Abimelech to Abraham (Genesis 20:16), and those also for which Joseph was sold (Genesis 37:28), were proably in the form of rings. The shekel was the common standard of weight and value among the Hebrews down to the time of the Captivity. Only once is a shekel of gold mentioned (1 Chronicles 21:25). The "six thousand of gold" mentioned in the transaction between Naaman and Gehazi (2 Kings 5:5) were probably so many shekels of gold. The "piece of money" mentioned in Job 42:11; Genesis 33:19 (marg., "lambs") was the Hebrew kesitah, probably an uncoined piece of silver of a certain weight in the form of a sheep or lamb, or perhaps having on it such an impression. The same Hebrew word is used in Joshua 24:32, which is rendered by Wickliffe "an hundred yonge scheep."