enclosure
/ɛnˈkloʊʒəɹ/ noun C1- Something that is enclosed, i.e. inserted into a letter or similar package. · There was an enclosure with the letter — a photo.
- 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.
- 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 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.
- The act of restricting access to ideas, works of art or technologies using patents or intellectual property laws.
- The post-feudal process of subdivision of common lands for individual ownership. · Strip-farming disappeared after enclosure.
- The area of a convent, monastery, etc where access is restricted to community members.
Plural enclosures
From the library
It was a poky, little, shabby-genteel place, where four lines of dingy two-storied brick houses looked out into a small railed-in enclosure, where a lawn of weedy grass and a few clumps of faded laurel bushes made a hard fight against a smoke-laden and uncongenial atmosphere.
Monte Cristo looked for the entrance to the enclosure, and was not long in finding a little wooden gate, working on willow hinges, and fastened with a nail and string.
Never had Flora, the fresh and smiling goddess of gardeners, been honored with a purer or more scrupulous worship than that which was paid to her in this little enclosure.
There was not a blade of grass to be seen in the paths, or a weed in the flower-beds; no fine lady ever trained and watered her geraniums, her cacti, and her rhododendrons, in her porcelain jardinière with more pains than this hitherto unseen gardener bestowed upon his little enclosure.
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