enveloped


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en·vel·op

 (ĕn-vĕl′əp)
tr.v. en·vel·oped, en·vel·op·ing, en·vel·ops
1. To wrap, enclose, or cover: "Accompanying the darkness, a stillness envelops the city" (Curtis Wilkie).
2. To surround: The troops enveloped the town.

[Middle English envolupen, to be involved in, from Old French envoluper, envoloper : en-, in; see en-1 + voloper, to wrap up; perhaps akin to Medieval Latin faluppa, chaff, straw (influenced by Latin volvere, to roll).]

en·vel′op·er n.
en·vel′op·ment n.
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
References in classic literature ?
This precious commodity they brought to the house, enveloped in multitudinous folds of leaves; and as a special mark of the esteem in which they held me, would spread an immense leaf on the ground, and dropping one by one a few minute particles of the salt upon it, invite me to taste them.
Now, one evening when D'Artagnan, who was in the trenches, was not able to accompany them, Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, mounted on their battle steeds, enveloped in their war cloaks, with their hands upon their pistol butts, were returning from a drinking place called the Red Dovecot, which Athos had discovered two days before upon the route to Jarrie, following the road which led to the camp and quite on their guard, as we have stated, for fear of an ambuscade, when, about a quarter of a league from the village of Boisnau, they fancied they heard the sound of horses approaching them.
Immediately after quitting it, we were enveloped in clouds of snow.
"In one moment I've seen what has hitherto been Enveloped in absolute mystery, And without extra charge I will give you at large A Lesson in Natural History."
The latter article of dress was of great importance, since it enveloped the wearer's body nearly to the knees, and was perhaps bedizened with the amount of his whole year's income, in golden flowers and foliage.
Before he could break out of the numbness that enveloped him like a sheet of lead, he heard far below, as if in the entrails of the earth, a door close heavily.
Not once did she look back upon the ruin that brooded like a huge monster--a black spot in the darkness that enveloped it.