Encroach

Pronunciation

• UK IPA: /É›nˈkɹəʊtʃ/, /ɪnˈkɹəʊtʃ/
• Rhymes: -əʊtʃ

Origin

From Old French encrochier ("seize"), from en- + croc ("hook").

Full definition of encroach

Verb

1. (transitive, obsolete) to seize, appropriate
2. (intransitive) to intrude unrightfully on someone else's rights or territory
• 2005, Plato, Sophist. Translation by Lesley Brown. .Because change itself would absolutely stay-stable, and again, conversely, stability itself would change, if each of them encroached on the other.
3. (intransitive) to advance gradually beyond due limits

Derived terms

• encroacher
• encroachment

Noun

1. (rare) Encroachment.
• 1805, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, ‘What is Life?’:All that we see, all colours of all shade,
  By encroach of darkness made?
• 2002, Caroline Winterer, The Culture of Classicism, JHU Press 2002, p. 116:Shorey was among the most vociferous opponents of the encroach of scientism and utilitarianism in education and society in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.