Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • transitive verb To make into or as if into a slave.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To make a slave of; reduce to slavery or bondage; subject to the arbitrary will of a master: as, barbarous nations enslave their prisoners of war.
  • Figuratively, to reduce to a condition analogous to slavery; deprive of moral liberty or power; subject to an enthralling influence: as, to be enslaved by drink or one's passions.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To reduce to slavery; to make a slave of; to subject to a dominant influence.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb transitive To make subservient; to strip one of freedom; enthrall.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb make a slave of; bring into servitude

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

en- +‎ slave

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Examples

  • I saw a parcel of people caballing together to ruin property, corrupt the laws, invade the Government, debauch the people, and in short, enslave and embroil the nation, and I cried 'Fire!' or rather I cried 'Water!' for the fire was begun already.

    Daniel Defoe Minto, William, 1845-1893 1879

  • Government, debauch the people, and in short, enslave and embroil the nation, and I cried 'Fire!' or rather I cried 'Water!' for the fire was begun already.

    Daniel Defoe William Minto 1869

  • Miller claims that the government uses grammar to "enslave" Americans and offers up his truly weird "Truth-language" as an antidote.

    Mark Potok: Who is Jared Lee Loughner? Mark Potok 2011

  • Miller claims that the government uses grammar to "enslave" Americans and offers up his truly weird "Truth-language" as an antidote.

    Mark Potok: Who is Jared Lee Loughner? Mark Potok 2011

  • Miller claims that the government uses grammar to "enslave" Americans and offers up his truly weird "Truth-language" as an antidote.

    Mark Potok: Who is Jared Lee Loughner? Mark Potok 2011

  • Germans bludgeon the French armies into surrender, then "enslave" much of the local population to service the German military regime.

    Movie:Why We Fight - Capra Zen Tiger 2010

  • Before the "black helicopters" of the 1990s, there were right-wingers claiming access to secret documents from the 1920s proving that the entire concept of a "civil rights movement" had been hatched in the Soviet Union; when the landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act was introduced, one frequently read in the South that it would "enslave" whites.

    Archive 2009-08-01 Stephen Retherford 2009

  • We did not "enslave" domesticated animals- we co-evolved.

    Reading Michael Pollan is bad for you. Or good. Presents 2009

  • It is one of the ways the Financial institutions maintain control and continue to 'enslave' the public.

    Obama: Banks 'don't get it' 2009

  • We did not "enslave" domesticated animals- we co-evolved.

    Archive 2009-04-01 Presents 2009

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