sunk fence

American  

noun

1. a wall or other barrier set in a ditch to divide lands without marring the landscape.

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sunk fence British  

noun

1. Also called: ha-ha.  a ditch, one side of which is made into a retaining wall so as to enclose an area of land while remaining hidden in the total landscape

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Etymology

Origin of sunk fence

First recorded in 1755–65

Example Sentences

His people and hers lived in the same sombre London square: their Haslemere gardens were divided only by a sunk fence.

From Project Gutenberg

It was semicircular in shape, with a stone balustrade, and hung some fifteen feet above a terraced walk which ran below it, and was separated from the chase by a low sunk fence.

From Project Gutenberg

Ha-ha, Hawhaw, haw-haw′, n. a sunk fence, or a ditch not seen till close upon it.

From Project Gutenberg

And in Spring what a choir of nightingales sang in the gnarled whitethorn trees by the sunk fence, and in late summer what myriads of grasshoppers chirruped in the twilight.

From Project Gutenberg

The white figure stood on the little bridge which led over the sunk fence into the meadow.

From Project Gutenberg