Definition
A Law French term meaning to imitate or counterfeit. In historical legal usage, *contrefaire* described the act of producing a false copy or imitation of something — most commonly a document, seal, coin, or signature — with intent to deceive. The term appears in early common law pleading and in legal texts drawing on Norman French vocabulary, where it functioned as a verb of art denoting fraudulent imitation rather than mere copying.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): The English verb "counterfeit" (derived directly from the French *contrefaire*) means to imitate something, especially currency or official documents, with intent to deceive or defraud.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): "Counterfeit" — to imitate with a view to deceiving; to forge; to copy or imitate without authority or right, and with a view to defraud by passing the copy or thing forged for that which is original or genuine.
The gap here is minimal in substance but significant in form: *contrefaire* is the Law French root from which the English legal vocabulary of counterfeiting descends. Researchers encountering the term in historical pleadings or Norman French legal texts should understand it as a verb, not a noun, and should not assume it carries the narrower modern connotation of currency fraud — in early usage it encompassed imitation of seals, instruments, and signatures as readily as coin.
Common Confusion
*Contrefaire* is occasionally conflated with *faux* or *falsum* in historical sources, but the terms carry distinct emphases. *Falsum* (Latin) referred broadly to falsification or fraud, while *contrefaire* carried the specific sense of imitative reproduction — making a copy designed to pass as the original. Researchers should also distinguish *contrefaire* from *forge* (to fabricate from scratch) and from *falsify* (to alter an existing genuine document). The imitative element is the defining characteristic of *contrefaire*.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in pre-modern English legal records, Year Books, or Norman French plea rolls will encounter *contrefaire* and its variants as a technical term of pleading in cases involving false documents, counterfeit seals, and forged instruments. Several navigational points matter:
First, the term's reach in historical sources is broader than modern "counterfeiting." It covers what we would today separate into forgery, counterfeiting, and fraud by false instrument — categories that were not yet sharply distinguished in early common law.
Second, Burrill's entry is brief and points to Kelham's *Dictionary of the Norman and Old French Language* as the authority, which means corpus researchers tracing this term's legal usage should follow that thread into the Norman French lexicographic tradition rather than relying solely on English law dictionaries.
Third, the editorial contamination in Burrill's entry is worth flagging: the text immediately following the *contrefaire* definition slides into a passage about contribution in equity (citing Story, Smith's Leading Cases, and Co. 11), which is entirely unrelated. This appears to be a typographical artifact of Burrill's original print layout — a column-break error that merged two entries. Researchers should not infer any legal connection between *contrefaire* and contribution doctrine.
Fourth, because *contrefaire* is Law French, its appearance in a document can itself be a dating and jurisdictional signal — Law French was the language of English court proceedings and pleadings from roughly the Norman Conquest through its formal abolition by statute in 1731 (4 Geo. II c. 26). An instrument using *contrefaire* as a term of art is almost certainly pre-eighteenth century in origin or is consciously archaizing.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary gives only a two-word gloss — "To imitate; to counterfeit" — with attribution to Kelham, and nothing further of substance. This brevity reflects the nature of the term: it is a Law French lexical item rather than a doctrine, and historical dictionaries treat it accordingly as a vocabulary entry rather than a conceptual one. No significant divergence exists among historical sources on its core meaning. What historical dictionaries do not supply is any discussion of the doctrinal uses to which the term was put — for that, researchers must look to Year Book indices and to specialized studies of medieval English pleading.
Jurisdictional Note
*Contrefaire* is specific to the English common law tradition via the Norman French channel. It has no direct counterpart in civil law systems, where Latin vocabulary (*falsum*, *falsificatio*) served equivalent functions. Scottish legal sources may use related French-derived vocabulary but through a distinct tradition.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia — Counterfeiting; Forgery