enclosure

English

Alternative forms

inclosure (was as common as or more common until the early 1800s; now uncommon)

Etymology

From Middle English enclosure, from Old French enclosure, from enclore, from Latin inclūdere, inclūdō, from in- (“in”) + claudō (“to shut”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kleh₂u- (“key, hook, nail”). Alike to inclusion.

Pronunciation

(US) IPA^(key): /ɛnˈkloʊʒəɹ/, /ɪnˈkloʊʒəɹ/
(UK) IPA^(key): /ɪnˈkləʊʒə/
Audio (Southern England) (file)
(New Zealand) IPA^(key): /ɘnˈklɐʉʒɘ/
Hyphenation: en‧clo‧sure

Noun

enclosure (countable and uncountable, plural enclosures)

(countable) Something enclosed, i.e. inserted into a letter or similar package.
There was an enclosure with the letter — a photo.
(uncountable) The act of enclosing, i.e. the insertion or inclusion of an item in a letter or package.
The enclosure of a photo with your letter is appreciated.
(countable) An area, domain, or amount of something partially or entirely enclosed by barriers.
He faced punishment for creating the fenced enclosure in a public park.
The glass enclosure holds the mercury vapor.
The winning horse was first into the unsaddling enclosure.
- 1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, […], OCLC 1042815524, part I, page 199:
  And the village was deserted, the huts gaped black, rotting, all askew within the fallen enclosures.
(uncountable) The act of separating and surrounding an area, domain, or amount of something with a barrier.
The enclosure of public land is against the law.
The experiment requires the enclosure of mercury vapor in a glass tube.
At first, untrained horses resist enclosure.
(uncountable, by extension) The act of restricting access to ideas, works of art or technologies using patents or intellectual property laws.
- 2014, Astra Taylor, chapter 5, in The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age, Henry Holt and Company, →ISBN:
  Copyright, from day one, was designed to be both an impediment and an incentive, a mechanism of enclosure (one that prevented the unlicensed printing of texts, thereby limiting access) and a catalyst of sorts, a structure to stimulate the production of literary goods by rewarding writers and publishers for their labor.
- 2019, Robert Stam, World Literature, Transnational Cinema, and Global Media‎, Routledge, →ISBN:
  The commons evokes resistance to “enclosure” in all its forms, whether in its early proto-capitalist form of fencing in commonly shared land, or in its contemporary forms of marshalling judicial restraints such as “patent” and “intellectual property” to police the ownership of ideas.
(uncountable, British History) The post-feudal process of subdivision of common lands for individual ownership.
Strip-farming disappeared after enclosure.
(religion) The area of a convent, monastery, etc where access is restricted to community members.

Usage notes

For more on the spelling of this word, see enclose.

Derived terms

banjo enclosure

Translations

something enclosed

Bulgarian: приложе́ние (bg) n (priložénie)
Catalan: tancament (ca) m
Chinese:
Mandarin: 附件 (zh) (fùjiàn)
Czech: příloha (cs) f
Danish: indlæg n, bilag n
Finnish: liite (fi)
French: pièce jointe (fr) f
German: Anlage (de) f, Beilage (de) f
Italian: allegato (it) m
Japanese: 別紙 (ja) (べっし, besshi)
Latin: clausum n
Russian: приложе́ние (ru) n (priložénije), вложе́ние (ru) n (vložénije)
Serbo-Croatian:
Cyrillic: брањевито ?
Roman: branjevito ?
Spanish: encierro (es) m, cercamiento m
Turkish: ilişik (tr)

act of enclosing

Catalan: clausura f, tancament (ca) m
Czech: oplocení n, ohrazení n
French: encloitrer (fr), encloîtrer (fr)
German: Beilegen n, Beifügen n, Hinzufügen n
Maori: taiepatanga, tāepatanga
Russian: включение (ru) (vključenije), вложение (ru) n (vloženije)
Spanish: encierro (es) m, cercamiento m

area partially or entirely enclosed by walls, fences or buildings

Bulgarian: оградено място n (ogradeno mjasto)
Catalan: tancat (ca) m
Chinese:
Mandarin: 圍場／围场 (zh) (wéichǎng)
Danish: indhegning c
Finnish: suljettu alue, aidattu alue
French: enclos (fr) m
Gallo: tio m
German: Gehege (de) n, eingefriedetes Grundstück n, Einschließung (de) f
Gothic: 𐌲𐌰𐍂𐌳𐌰 m (garda)
Greek:
Ancient: περίβολος m (períbolos)
Icelandic: girðing (is) f
Irish: clós (ga) m, bábhún m, banrach f, loca m, mainnear f, fál m
Italian: recinto (it) m
Japanese: 囲い込み (かこいこみ, kakoikomi)
Latin: clausum n
Norwegian:
Bokmål: innhegning (no) m or f
Nynorsk: innhegning f
Old English: tūn m
Portuguese: cercado (pt) m
Romanian: împrejmuire (ro) f
Russian: огоро́женное ме́сто n (ogoróžennoje mésto)
Serbo-Croatian:
Cyrillic: бра̀њевина f, одрађевина f
Roman: brànjevina (sh) f, odrađevina f
Spanish: encierro (es) m, recinto (es) m
Swedish: inhägnad (sv) c, hage (sv) c
Tocharian B: prautke
Turkish: çevrelenmiş, çitlenmiş

act of separating and surrounding an area etc. with a barrier

Czech: ohrazení n
French: cloitrer (fr)
German: Einzäunen n, Einschließen (de) n
Maori: taiepatanga, tāepatanga
Russian: ограждение (ru) (ograždenije)

post-feudal process of subdivision of common lands for individual ownership

Spanish: reparto (es) m
Turkish: çitleme (tr)

inaccessible part of the monastery

Catalan: clausura f
French: cloître (fr) m
German: Klausur (de) f
Italian: clausura (it) f
Latin: clausura f
Polish: klauzura (pl) f
Spanish: clausura (es) f

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

Old English: ^{(please verify)} haga

Anagrams

corneules, encolures

Old French

Alternative forms

encloseure

Etymology

enclos-, stem of enclore +‎ -ure.

Noun

enclosure f (oblique plural enclosures, nominative singular enclosure, nominative plural enclosures)

enclosure (act of enclosing something)
enclosure (enclosed area)

References

Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (encloseure)

enclosure on the Anglo-Norman On-Line Hub