encircle

Etymology

It is formed from English en- + circle.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Its base, the noun for a round figure, is from Old French cercle (“circle, ring”), from Latin circulus (“circular figure, small ring”), a diminutive of circus (“ring”).^[3][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of things or bodies of people, to form a circle round, to surround: before 1400, in Morte Arthure.^[2][4] Etymonline says about 1400,^[3] Dictionary.com 1350–1400,^[8] and the Shorter Oxford, which has no medieval record, the late 16th century.^[9]

Semantic evolution

The word stayed close to its first meaning of surrounding, with the spelling incircle also in use.^[9] From 1611, in J. Speed's history, it could take with, to surround or gird one thing with another.^[2] Shakespeare's Merry Wives of Windsor, written before 1616, has the sense of making a circling movement about someone or something,^[2] which the Shorter Oxford now calls rare.^[9] Transferred and figurative uses are recorded from 1774, in Goldsmith's Retaliation.^[2] Johnson (1755) defined it by surrounding and enclosing in a ring, and quoted Pope's Odyssey for "encircling seas".^[10] The noun encirclement came only in the 20th century,^[4][9] and the Shorter Oxford connects it especially with a country surrounded by hostile countries.^[9]

Timeline

• before 1400 – to form a circle round, to surround.^[2][4]
• 1611 – to surround or gird with something.^[2]
• before 1616 – to make a circling movement about someone or something.^[2]
• 1774 – transferred and figurative uses.^[2]
• 1919 – the noun encirclement.^[4]

Meanings

Verb

1. To form a circle around; to surround: A low wall encircled the garden.^[11][6][2]
2. To enclose within a circle, as by drawing one: The teacher encircled each wrong answer.^[11][6]
3. To move in a circle around; to make a circuit of.^[6][2][9]

Word family

• encirclement
• unencircled

Related words

• circle
• circus

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
11. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins