Base metal
any metal other than a precious or noble metal, as copper, lead, zinc, or tin.
Compare noble metal, precious metal.
the principal metal of an alloy.
the principal metal of a piece underlying a coating of another metal; core.
Historical Examples
He knows it is only base metal, washed over with a thin varnish of learning.
Roundabout Papers William Makepeace Thackeray
Her talisman was of base metal, the one cheap thing she wore, yet real.
The Bright Messenger Algernon Blackwood
In a few days he brought back six coins, which he insisted were of base metal.
Mysteries of Police and Crime Arthur Griffiths
If the quartz be clean, and the gold unmixed with base metal, the difficulty is small.
Getting Gold J. C. F. Johnson
You ring a choice few of these on the counter and prove them base metal.
Adventures in Criticism Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
A pair of scales for weighing ore and buttons of base metal.
The A B C of Mining Charles A. Bramble
Well, all his metal melted, and ran away, and he saw it had been nothing but a base metal after all.
The Furnace Rose Macaulay
He knows what is bad, and with him base metal is never offered us for gold.
Arts and Crafts Essays Various
To speak honestly, the savant is a complex of very various impulses and attractive forces—he is a base metal throughout.
Thoughts Out of Season (Part II) Friedrich Nietzsche
It is base metal from the devil’s mint, and is worthless in God’s sight.
Practical Religion John Charles Ryle
noun
any of certain common metals such as copper, lead, zinc, and tin, as distinct from the precious metals, gold, silver, and platinum
Read Also:
- Base number
noun a number or quantity which is arbitrarily made the fundamental number of a system; also called base Examples Ten is the base number of the decimal system of numeration. Historical Examples So I suppose it took three times the base number for the third batch? Double or Nothing Jack Sharkey
- Base of heart
base of heart base of heart n. The part of the heart formed mainly by the left atrium and to a lesser extent by the posterior part of the right atrium, directed backward and to the right, and separated from the vertebral column by the esophagus and aorta.
- Base of skull
base of skull base of skull n. The interior aspect of the skull, on which the brain rests. The inferior or external aspect of the skull.
- Base of lung
base of lung base of lung n. The lower concave part of the lung that rests upon the convex part of the diaphragm.
- Base of stapes
base of stapes base of stapes n. The flat portion of the stirrup of the ear that fits in the oval window between the middle and inner ear. Also called footplate.