Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- transitive verb To confine within or as if within walls; imprison.
- transitive verb To build into a wall.
- transitive verb To entomb in a wall.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To surround with walls; wall; fortify; protect.
- To inclose within walls; hence, to shut up or confine, in general.
- noun An inclosure; a wall.
- To build into a wall; imbed in masonry.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb obsolete To wall around; to surround with walls.
- transitive verb To inclose whithin walls, or as within walls; hence, to shut up; to imprison; to incarcerate.
- noun obsolete A wall; an inclosure.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb transitive To
cloister ,confine ,imprison : to lock up behind walls. - verb transitive To
put orbury within awall . - verb transitive To
trap orcapture (animpurity ); chiefly in the participial adjectiveimmured and gerund or gerundial nounimmuring . - noun obsolete A
wall ; anenclosure .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb lock up or confine, in or as in a jail
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Support
Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word immure.
Examples
-
Sensible it was impossible ever to remove the fatal truth, or the impression to her father of her lost virtue, she formed the frantic resolution of setting off for the wild solitudes of Cumberland, and there immure herself alive for the remainder of her existence.
-
Higden having had the imprudence, in his grief, to make known his recent misfortune, it had reached the ears of his landlord, who already was watchful and suspicious, from a year and half arrears of his rent; and steps were immediately preparing to seize whatever was upon the premises the next morning; which, by bringing upon him all his other creditors, would infallibly immure him in the lingering hopelessness of a prison.
Camilla 2008
-
Or that we immure ourselves in the aisles of Metropolitan Market, Whole Foods, Trader Joe's or Larry's Market.
Seattle Bon Vivant: 2005
-
Though the bank isn't state-owned it isn't immure from state policy.
The Craze For CMB Vivian Wai-yin Kwok 2006
-
She has fantasies of murdering both of them, but everything seems to indicate that she decides rather to immure herself in a perverse pact with the house servant.
-
Do you think that that woman, who sits at Barchester in high places, disgracing herself and that puny ecclesiastical lord who is her husband — do you think that she would not immure me if she could?
-
Lady Selina, evidently discrediting so unlikely a story, and thinking it all but impossible that her brother should immure himself at Grey Abbey during the London season.
-
He did not immure himself in the solid structure of his social relations, but had made of them, so as to be able to set it up afresh upon new foundations wherever a woman might take his fancy, one of those collapsible tents which explorers carry about with them.
Swann's Way 2003
-
At its worst, this habit of optimism allows us to bury our heads in the sand, deny the ubiquity of pain in ourselves and others, and to immure ourselves in a state of deliberate heartlessness to ensure our emotional survival.
Buddha Armstrong, Karen, 1944- 2001
-
I shall immure myself in my quarters, and none of you, "he said, shaking his heavy fore - finger at us," shall come near me until" "he paused dramatically" 'that period is over and I know myself to be clean. "
Nerilka's Story McCaffrey, Anne 1986
bilby commented on the word immure
"Not surprisingly, Sally shuddered at the thought of being immured in the black cave, to die slowly and hopelessly, far below the sunny hillside."
- Peter Pierce, 'The Fiction of Gabrielle Lord', Australian Literary Studies, October 1999.
May 21, 2009