Definition
An obsolete and variant spelling of EMBEZZLE. The form "imbezzle" appears in older legal texts and statutes but carries no independent legal meaning distinct from embezzle. All three source dictionaries treat it as a cross-reference only, with Black's 2nd edition explicitly characterizing it as "an occasional or obsolete form." Researchers encountering this spelling in historical documents should read it as equivalent in meaning to embezzle: the fraudulent conversion of property lawfully entrusted to one's care, typically by an employee, fiduciary, or public officer.
Why It Matters in Research
The primary research value of this entry is orthographic. Variant spellings were common in legal instruments, statutes, indictments, and court records before spelling standardization consolidated around "embezzle" in the nineteenth century. A researcher working in colonial-era records, early American statutes, or English common law materials may encounter "imbezzle," "imbezzel," or similar forms and should recognize them as functionally identical to the modern term.
Full-text searches of historical corpus materials will miss relevant documents if the query is limited to the modern spelling. Any search strategy for embezzlement-related materials in pre-1850 sources should include "imbezzle" and its inflected forms (imbezzled, imbezzling, imbezzlement) as alternative query terms.
There is no recorded instance of a court drawing a substantive legal distinction between "imbezzle" and "embezzle." The variation is entirely one of spelling, not doctrine.
Historical Dictionary Support
All three source dictionaries are in complete agreement: "imbezzle" is a variant or obsolete spelling with no independent doctrinal content. Black's 1st edition and Rapalje & Lawrence both redirect readers to "embezzle" without further comment. Black's 2nd edition adds the only substantive gloss, calling it "an occasional or obsolete form," which confirms the spelling was still circulating in some legal usage at the time of that edition's publication in 1910 but was already receding. None of the sources treat this as a term of art requiring separate analysis. The historical dictionaries offer no points of divergence on this entry, nor is there anything they miss — the entry is complete as a spelling variant.