Definition of "falsify"

falsify

/ˈfɒlsɪfaɪ/

verb
third-person singular simple present falsifies, present participle falsifying, simple past and past participle falsified
1. (transitive) To alter so as to make false; to make incorrect.
  Quotations
  The Irish bards use to forge and falsify everything as they list, to please or displease any man.
  1596 (date written; published 1633), Edmund Spenser, A Vewe of the Present State of Irelande […], Dublin: […] Societie of Stationers, […]; republished as A View of the State of Ireland […] (Ancient Irish Histories), Dublin: […] Society of Stationers, […] Hibernia Press, […] [b]y John Morrison, 1809,
2. (transitive) To misrepresent.
3. (transitive) To prove to be false.
  Quotations
  By how much better than my word I am, / By so much shall I falsify men's hope.
  c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act I, scene ii]
  Hovv much greater confirmation of his faith vvould he have received, had he ſeen our Saviour's prophecy ſtand good in the deſtruction of the temple, and the diſſolution of the Jevviſh œconomy, vvhen Jevvs and Pagans united all their endeavours under Julian the Apoſtate, to baffle and falſify the prediction?
  a. 1720 (date written), Joseph Addison, “Section VIII. Against Atheism and Infidelity.”, in The Evidences of the Christian Religion, […], London: […] J[acob] Tonson […], published 1730, subsection VI, page 66
4. (transitive) To counterfeit; to forge.
5. (transitive, accounting) To show (an item of charge inserted in an account) to be wrong.
  Quotations
  It will allow the account to stand, with liberty to the plaintiff to surcharge and falsify it
  1833, Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States
  The chancery rules governing proceedings to surcharge and falsify accounts are applicable only where an account has been stated between the parties, or where something equivalent thereto has been done.
  1912, Peyton Boyle, The Federal Reporter: Cases Argued and Determined in the Circuit District Courts of the United States
6. (transitive, obsolete) To baffle or escape.
  Quotations
  For disputants (as swordsmen use to fence / With blunted foyles) engage with blunted sense; / And as th' are wont to falsify a blow, / Use nothing else to pass upon a foe […]
  a. 1680, Samuel Butler, Fragments of an intended second part of the foregoing satire
7. (transitive, obsolete) To violate; to break by falsehood.
  Quotations
  he would not falsify his promise to Philanax
  a. 1587, Philippe Sidnei [i.e., Philip Sidney], “(please specify the page number)”, in Fulke Greville, Matthew Gwinne, and John Florio, editors, The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia [The New Arcadia], London: […] [John Windet] for William Ponsonbie, published 1590; republished in Albert Feuillerat, editor, The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia (Cambridge English Classics: The Complete Works of Sir Philip Sidney; I), Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: University Press, 1912,

Definition of "falsify"

falsify

verb

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