enmesh, emmesh, immesh, v.
(ɛnˈmɛʃ, ɛˈmɛʃ, ɪˈmɛʃ)
Also 7 enmash.
[f. en-1 + mesh.]
1. trans. To surround with meshes; to catch or entangle in, or as in, a net. Also of the net, and fig.
| α 1604 Shakes. Oth. ii. iii. 367 The Net that shall en-mash them all. a 1669 Le Blanc in Spurgeon Treas. Dav. Ps. cxix. 61 A gladiator with net and sword..endeavouring to enmesh any one who comes near him. 1831 E. J. Trelawny Adv. Younger Son I. 202 They have here a ring-fence of posts, in which the King of Candy is enmeshed. 1847 Grote Greece ii. xi. III. 132 Declining to haul up the net when the fish were already enmeshed. 1884 Harper's Mag. Sept. 499/1 Vines..enmeshing every stone in their tenacious threads. |
| β 1870 Morris Earthly Par. I. ii. 606 A past song..Emmeshed for ever in the memory's net. |
| γ 1774 Goldsm. Nat. Hist. VII. 236 Spider..careful to observe when the fly is completely immeshed. 1853 C. Brontë Villette xvi. (1855) 160, I got immeshed in a network of turns unknown. |
2. fig. To entrap, entangle; to make (thought) complicated.
| α 1822 Shelley Let. Hunt, Debts, responsibilities, and expenses will enmesh you round about. 1863 Mrs. C. Clarke Shaks. Char. xviii. 469 Buckingham's career with Richard contains an impressive lesson on weakness enmeshed by unscrupulous strength. |
| β 1870 Morris Earthly Par. II. iii. 242 Such things emmeshed his dying troubled thought. |
| γ 1865 Dickens Mut. Fr. i. xv, The undesigning Boffin had become so far immeshed. |
Hence
enˈmeshment, the state or condition of being enmeshed; entanglement.
| 1885 ‘C. E. Craddock’ (Miss Murfree) in Atlantic Monthly Apr. 434/2 In that enchanted enmeshment were tangled all the fancies of the night. 1885 Punch 30 May 258 As concerns Egyptian darkness, and the Muscovite enmeshment. |