Incarcerate

//ɪnˈkɑɹ.səˌɹeɪt// adj, verb

adj, verb ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Verb
  1. 1
    To lock away; to imprison, especially for breaking the law. US, transitive

    "Tolokonnikova has also been an effective public speaker even while incarcerated, but she has spoken out on politics and freedom in general rather than prisoners’ rights."

  2. 2
    lock up or confine, in or as in a jail wordnet
  3. 3
    To confine; to shut up or enclose; to hem in. transitive
Adjective
  1. 1
    Incarcerated: jailed, imprisoned, confined, shut in. archaic, not-comparable, obsolete

    "Tane and incarcerat, kepit heir an there"

Synonyms

All synonyms
imprisonimprisonjailjailarrestbastille

Example

More examples

"If we incarcerate these old men, we can take control."

Etymology

The adjective is first attested in 1528, the verb in 1575; borrowed from Medieval Latin incarcerātus, perfect passive participle of incarcerō (“to imprison”) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix) and -ate (adjective-forming suffix)), from Latin in- (“in”) + carcer (“a prison”) + -ō (verb-forming suffix). Common participial usage of the adjective up until Early Modern English.

Related phrases

lock away

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.