Dictionary entry

Interpolation

Webster's Dictionary 1913

In‐ter′po‐la″tion (?), n. [L. interpolatio an alteration made here and there: cf. F. interpolation.] 1. The act of introducing or inserting anything, especially that which is spurious or foreign.

2. That which is introduced or inserted, especially something foreign or spurious.

Bentley wrote a letter.... upon the scriptural glosses in our present copies of Hesychius, which he considered interpolations from a later hand. De Quincey.

3. (Math.) The method or operation of finding from a few given terms of a series, as of numbers or observations, other intermediate terms in conformity with the law of the series.