envelop
Americanverb (used with object)
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to wrap up in or as in a covering.
The long cloak she was wearing enveloped her completely.
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to serve as a wrapping or covering for, as a membrane of an organ or a sheath.
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to surround entirely.
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Military. to attack (an enemy's flank).
noun
verb
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to wrap or enclose in or as if in a covering
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to conceal or obscure, as from sight or understanding
a plan enveloped in mystery
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to surround or partially surround (an enemy force)
Other Word Forms
- enveloper noun
- envelopment noun
- preenvelop verb (used with object)
- unenveloped adjective
Etymology
Origin of envelop
1350–1400; Middle English envolupen < Old French envoluper, equivalent to en- en- 1 + voloper to envelop, of obscure origin; compare Old Provençal ( en ) volopar, Italian inviluppare to envelop, Italian viluppo tuft, bundle, confusion, referred to Medieval Latin faluppa chaff, wisp of straw, perhaps influenced by the descendants of Latin volvere to roll
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Traders started the new week with markets yet again enveloped in a distinctly risk-off mood.
From MarketWatch
The stuffy heat of the second floor enveloped us on the landing.
From Literature
Robe enveloped the lounge in a saturated Kelly Green.
“I wasn’t a fragile, vulnerable creature onstage, begging the audience to protect me and envelop me,” she writes.
But before the U.S. launched its airstrikes, the Gulf governments had been resisting the prospect of a U.S. attack, fearing that it could provoke a regional conflict that would envelop them.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
