rotten

a. [ Icel. rotinn; akin to Sw. rutten, Dan. radden. See Rot. ] Having rotted; putrid; decayed; as, a rotten apple; rotten meat. Hence: (a) Offensive to the smell; fetid; disgusting. [ 1913 Webster ]

You common cry of curs! whose breath I hate
As reek of the rotten fens. Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

(b) Not firm or trusty; unsound; defective; treacherous; unsafe; as, a rotten plank, bone, stone. “The deepness of the rotten way.” Knolles. [ 1913 Webster ]

Rotten borough. See under Borough. --
Rotten stone (Min.), a soft stone, called also Tripoli (from the country from which it was formerly brought), used in all sorts of finer grinding and polishing in the arts, and for cleaning metallic substances. The name is also given to other friable siliceous stones applied to like uses. [ 1913 Webster ]

Syn. -- Putrefied; decayed; carious; defective; unsound; corrupt; deceitful; treacherous. [ 1913 Webster ]

-- Rot"ten*ly, adv. -- Rot"ten*ness, n. [ 1913 Webster ]