Forms: see COIN (also 5 cunage, 6 kownnage). [a. OF. coignaige, f. coignier to COIN: see -AGE.]
1. The action or process of coining money. b. The right of coining money.
c. 1380. Sir Ferumb., 5481. Four floryns of gold of god coygnage.
1494. Fabyan, VII. 401. Dampned certayne coynes … and caused theym to be broughte vnto newe coynage.
1523. Skelton, Garl. Laurel, 611. Fals forgers of mony for kownnage [ed. 1568 coinage] atteintid.
1594. Plat, Jewell-ho., III. Chem. Conclus., 86. Ending in cosenage, quoinage, or Capistro.
1648. D. Jenkins, Wks., The Table, The power of coynadge in the King.
1725. Swift, Drapier’s Lett., Wks. 1755, V. II. 41. If this coinage had been in Ireland, and granted to persons of this kingdom.
1869. J. G. Hubbard, in Gold Coinage Controversy, 31. If the mintage be sensibly increased beyond the cost of coinage, you provoke private coinage.
2. concr. Coins collectively, coin; a system of coins in use or in currency; the currency. Decimal coinage: a system of coins, each denomination or named value of which is ten times that of the next smaller: see DECIMAL.
1467. J. Paston, in Paston Lett., No. 573, II. 305. Daube nor I may no mor with owt coynage.
1577. Harrison, England, II. xxv. (1877), I. 366. Chaines of siluer … redie … to be melted into coinage.
1596. Shaks., 1 Hen. IV., IV. ii. 9. Ile answere the Coynage.
1672. Petty, Pol. Anat. (1691), 69. Men make Vessels of coyned Silver, if they can gain by the Workmanship enough to defray the Destruction of the Coynage.
1841. Elphinstone, Hist. Ind., I. 471. They are often square, a shape of which there is no example in any other Grecian coinage.
1876. Fawcett, Pol. Econ., III. iii. 359. The Mint, however, is not permitted to issue more than a certain amount of silver coinage.
Mod. The bronze coinage was issued in 1860.
b. Any currency or medium of exchange. Also fig.
a. 1839. Praed, Poems (1864), I. 24. In the coinage of your golden smiles.
1856. Woodward, Mollusca, 305. The N. American Indians used to make coinage (wampum) of the sea-worn fragments of Venus mercenaria.
† 3. ellipt. (See quot.) Obs.
a. 1734. North, Lives, III. 166. A law … called the coinage. This was a certain tax laid to pay for coining money.
4. The official stamping of blocks of tin (see COIN v. 3); the right of doing this, formerly a privilege of certain towns in Cornwall and Devon. Also attrib. as in coinage house, town.
1495. Act 11 Hen. VII., c. 4 § 12. Weightis apperteynyng … to the Cunage of Tynne within the counties of Cornewall and Devonshire.
1538. Leland, Itin., III. (1711), 9–10 (Hailstoun).
1577. Harrison, England, II. xxv. (1877), I. 365. There is also coignage of tin holden yearelie at … Midsummer and Michaelmas in the west countrie; which … I supposed to haue beene of monie of the said mettall…. Howbeit … I find it to be nothing so, but an office onlie erected for the prince … and such blocks of tin as haue passed the hands of his officers, are marked with an especiall stampe.
1708. Lond. Gaz., No. 4458/1. At the Coynage now held at Truroe.
1762. Borlase, in Phil. Trans., LII. 507. The driver of a plough … laden with tin, for Penzance Coinage.
1810. in Risdon’s Surv. Devon, 405. The Stannators … were elected by the Mayors … of certain Towns … called Coinage Towns.
5. fig. The (deliberate) formation of a new word, etc.; the fabrication of something specious.
1693. Dryden, Juvenal, Ded. viii.–ix. (J.). Unnecessary Coynage, as well as unnecessary Revival [of words], runs into Affectation.
1727. Swift, Art of Polit. Lying. Whether the right of coinage of Political Lyes be wholly in the government.
1787. Gentl. Mag., Dec., 1081/2. Milton … has enriched our language with some epithets … of his own coinage.
a. 1834. Coleridge, Method, in Encycl. Metr. (1849), 15. The Ancients, as well as the Moderns, had their machinery for the extemporaneous coinage of intellect.
1876. Freeman, Norm. Conq., V. xxv. 580. Modern French, like modern English, has cast away a crowd of vigorous and expressive words, the place of which is poorly supplied by words of modern coinage.
6. concr. That which is made, devised, or invented, an invention; e.g., a coined word. (Often used disparagingly, in implied contrast with ‘current word’; cf. COIN v. 5.)
1602. Shaks., Ham., III. iv. 137. This is the very coynage of your Braine.
1640. Sir E. Dering, Proper Sacrif. (1644), 67. Your last words, offering the body of Christ, are your own: indeed the coynage of your own brain.
1873. F. Hall, Mod. English, 59–60. Why might not Spenser try his hand at coining a word? Landor himself has ventured new coinages enough.
1879. Farrar, St. Paul, II. 462, note. Ἐθελοθρησκεία, a happy coinage of St. Paul’s.
