Definitions

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

  • transitive verb To have, impose, or require as a necessary accompaniment or consequence.
  • transitive verb To limit the inheritance of (property) to a specified succession of heirs.
  • transitive verb To bestow or impose on a person or a specified succession of heirs.
  • noun The act of entailing, especially property.
  • noun The state of being entailed.
  • noun An entailed estate.
  • noun A predetermined order of succession, as to an estate or to an office.
  • noun Something transmitted as if by unalterable inheritance.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun . Engraved or carved work; intaglio; inlay.
  • noun Shape; that which is carved or shaped.
  • noun In law: The limitation of land to certain members of a particular family or line of descent; a prescribed order of successive inheritances, voluntarily created, to keep land in the family undivided; the rule of descent settled for an estate.
  • noun An estate entailed or limited to particular heirs; an estate given to a man and his heirs.
  • To cut; carve for ornament.
  • In law, to limit and restrict the descent of (lands and tenements) by gift to a man and to a specified line of heirs, by settlement in such wise that neither the donee nor any subsequent possessor can alienate or bequeath it: as, to entail a manor to A. B. and to his eldest son, or to his heirs of his body begotten, or to his heirs by a particular wife. See entail, n., 3.
  • Hence To fix inalienably on a person or thing, or on a person and his descendants; transmit in an unalterable course; devolve as an unavoidable consequence.
  • To bring about; cause to ensue or accrue; induce; involve or draw after itself.

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

  • noun (Law) That which is entailed.
  • noun An estate in fee entailed, or limited in descent to a particular class of issue.
  • noun The rule by which the descent is fixed.
  • noun obsolete Delicately carved ornamental work; intaglio.
  • transitive verb To settle or fix inalienably on a person or thing, or on a person and his descendants or a certain line of descendants; -- said especially of an estate; to bestow as an heritage.
  • transitive verb obsolete To appoint hereditary possessor.
  • transitive verb obsolete To cut or carve in an ornamental way.

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

  • noun That which is entailed. Hence:
  • noun obsolete Delicately carved ornamental work; intaglio.
  • verb transitive To imply or require.
  • verb transitive To settle or fix inalienably on a person or thing, or on a person and his descendants or a certain line of descendants; -- said especially of an estate; to bestow as a heritage.
  • verb transitive (obsolete) To appoint hereditary possessor.
  • verb transitive (obsolete) To cut or carve in an ornamental way.

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

  • verb have as a logical consequence
  • noun the act of entailing property; the creation of a fee tail from a fee simple
  • verb limit the inheritance of property to a specific class of heirs
  • noun land received by fee tail
  • verb impose, involve, or imply as a necessary accompaniment or result

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English entaillen, to limit inheritance to specific heirs : en-, intensive pref.; see en– + taille, tail; see tail.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Old English entaile ("carving"), from Old French entaille ("incision"), from entailler ("to cut away"); from prefix en- + tailler ("to cut"), from Late Latin taliare, from Latin talea. Compare late Latin feudum talliatum ("a fee entailed, i.e., curtailed or limited").

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