Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To put a heavy load on; burden: a hiker who was encumbered with a heavy pack; a life that has always been encumbered with responsibilities.
- v. To hinder or impede the action or performance of: restrictions that encumber police work.
- v. To burden with legal or financial obligations: an estate that is encumbered with debts.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To clog or impede with a load, burden, or other hindrance; render difficult or laborious in motion or operation; embarrass; overload; perplex; obstruct.
- Specifically To place (property) under a charge or servitude; load with debt or liability: as, to encumber an estate with mortgages, or with a widow's dower; an encumbered title. See encumbrance, 3. Synonyms To oppress, overload, hinder, entangle, handicap, weigh down.
- n. An encumbrance; a hindrance.
Wiktionary
- v. transitive to load down something with a burden
- v. transitive to restrict or block something with a hindrance or impediment
- v. transitive to add a legal claim or other obligation
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To impede the motion or action of, as with a burden; to retard with something superfluous; to weigh down; to obstruct or embarrass
- v. To load with debts, or other legal claims.
WordNet 3.0
- v. hold back
Etymologies
- From Old French encombrer, from en- + combrer ("to hinder"); see cumber. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English encombren, from Old French encombrer, to block up : en-, in; see en-1 + combre, hindrance (from Gaulish *comboros). (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Crumbles and breaks, th 'encumber'd lines must flow.”
“Unfortunately, the worldviews that dominated American politics throughout the 20th century now encumber the nation's attempts to solve the problems it faces in the 21st.”
The Huffington Post: Matt Browne: Can America Emulate Germany's Economic Success?
“Spending cuts will further encumber the Navy's already withering fleet, which plays a central role in AirSea Battle.”
The Wall Street Journal: Asia Needs a Larger U.S. Defense Budget
“Steering clear of any trap to pin oneself down into boxes of identity which so often encumber films about marginalized communities Rees gracefully negotiates the line between heartbreak and hope to foreground the freedom found when we recognize ourselves for who we are, for who we love, and for who stands with us.”
The Huffington Post: Roya Rastegar: Sundance 2011 and the Sound of My Generation: Part II
“Sure, some websites capability kiss the feet your encumber, re-using it and putting ads on it – making bread from your tyrannically in the planning stages unemployed.”
The Culture of Sharing: Why Releasing Copyright Will Be the Smartest Thing You Do | Write to Done
“The likelihood of further "quantitative easing" in the U.S. has cast a shadow on currency markets that is likely to continue to encumber the dollar in the near term.”
The Wall Street Journal: Central Bank Actions Color Currency Outlook
“They could encumber and build up their own piece of the Ugandan dream, and grow assets, equity and a net worth, which can later be passed on to their equally enterprising children.”
The Huffington Post: John Hope Bryant: Dispatch From Uganda: What Africa Needs Now
“The advantage is no time and effort searching and preparing for the other alternatives, and you don't have to encumber yourself or give up control of your company.”
The Huffington Post: Marty Zwilling: Most Startups Get No Professional Investor Cash
“These afflictions encumber Americans with a heavy fiscal as well as health burden which is especially painful in a flagging economy.”
“As many survivors of divorce will attest, something good will come from the ashes of your marriage if you do not encumber your future with hate, revenge and useless conflict.”
The Huffington Post: Alison Patton: The Silver Lining of Divorce
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘encumber’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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EN - eloquence in public speaking
Key words from "The Training of a Public Speaker" by Grenville Kleiser (New York and London, 1920)
beget, imago, approbation, orator, peroration, Cicero, eloquence, elocution, rhetoric, premeditate, plead, Isocrates and 264 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
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gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1827 more...
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SAT words
abase, abate, abet, abject, abjure, abrogate, abscond, abstruse, accolade, accommodating, accost, accretion and 202 more...
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Words I Know
List of most of the words I've learned
garner, abase, abate, abdicate, abduct, aberration, abet, abhor, abide, abject, abjure, abnegation and 1046 more...
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curligirli0's Words
crapulous, swish, shiatsu, zen, xenoglossy, nincompoop, loquacious, pianissimo, onomatopoeia, imperturbable, silky, hosanas and 379 more...
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colleen's words ii
sibilant, sundry, spindle, distaff, device, mortar, pestle, scythe, flail, thresh, frown, elementary and 495 more...
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ADW1
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
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Vocab++
Words as I learn them.
fetid, mezzanine, hiatus, austerity, subliminal, resplendent, implacable, impugn, debase, exiguous, cirque, holster and 2538 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, E
excoriate, exoskeleton, enclave, endemic, erstwhile, entwine, elliptical, élan, earflaps, earlobe, earthen, earthenware and 238 more...
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From Book - SAT & College Dictionary ...
ebb, exotic, immure, abeyance, panegyric, debonair, protege, dissipate, frantic, penitent, abject, edify and 871 more...
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elij's Words
diegesis, intrinsic, semantic, salience, nonchalant, infosthetics, ambiguous, altruism, cynical, abstruse, vatic, encomium and 137 more...
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Loxodont's list
circumambulate, atelectasis, paramount, therefore, apotropaic, facture, identity, dome, lecture, cannibal, catatonia, rite and 119 more...
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5-0
Hecko, words! I’m so happy I’ve found you. I want to keep you all and never want to lose you again. I hope you like it here.
amscray, thistledown, tine, tinsel, pungent, snarl, wail, lanky, viscid, dawdle, luminous, stow and 2719 more...
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New GRE Preparation List
All the words which I encounter during my GRE studies. :)
rhetoric, errant, arrant, artless, artful, ephemeral, libel, rhapsody, cloy, conjecture, relegate, aberrant and 927 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for encumber.
seanahan Similarly queuecumber Oct 21, 2007