▪ I. burglary1
(ˈbɜːglərɪ)
Also 6 burgulary, 6–7 burglarie, burghlarie.
[see burglar n.]
The crime of breaking (formerly by night) into a house with intent to commit felony. Now, a statutory crime of entering a building by day or night with the intention of committing a theft or other serious offence. Also attrib.
The legal definition of burglary in the U.K. differs slightly from that of the U.S. and elsewhere (see quots. for certain distinctions).
| [1199–1216 Assize K. John in Placit. Abbrev. 68 De burgaria & aliis latrociniis..De Burgeria & de ligatura & aliis latrociniis. 1516 in Fitzherbert Graunde Abridgement 268 b, Que il vient a son meson de faire burglarie.] 1532–3 Act 24 Hen. VIII, v, Any suche persoune, so attemptinge to committe suche murder or burgulary. 1581 Lambarde Eiren. ii. vii. (1588) 262 Burghlarie is the theft done by entrie into a dwelling house. a 1603 T. Cartwright Confut. Rhem. N.T. (1618) 558 How like burglary theeues they break open all dores. 1649 Selden Laws Eng. i. xl. (1739) 63 Burning of woods was finable..but Burglary was Felony. 1679 Jesuites Ghostly Ways 3 Wounded his creditor, Hugh Hare, a Gentleman of the Temple, by committing burglary. 1768 Blackstone Comm. iv. xvi. 226 Neither can burglary be committed in a tent or booth erected in a market or fair. a 1843 Southey Nondescr. vi, There is a maggot there..it is his house, His castle..oh commit not burglary! 1855 Wharton Crim. Law U.S. 598 Burglary is the breaking and entering the dwelling-house of another in the night. Ibid. 611 The breaking and entering must be in the night. 1968 Hansard Lords 15 Feb. 217 Clauses 9 and 10 deal with burglary. They replace the complicated ‘breaking and entering offences’...The concept of ‘breaking’ is itself unsatisfactory... This Bill draws no distinction between different kinds of building or between night and day; the concept of breaking disappears and is replaced by the concept of entering as a trespasser. 1974 Encycl. Brit. Micropædia IX. 928/3 Housebreaking originally covered daytime entries, whereas burglary was limited to nighttime thefts; but burglary has been extended to cover all hours of the day and to cover buildings other than houses, as well as automobiles. 1975 A. D. Hechtman in McKinney's Consolidated Laws N.Y. 35 Burglary in the third degree is committed when a person knowingly enters or remains unlawfully in a building with intent to commit a crime therein. If such a building happens to be a dwelling, and the invasion occurs in the night time,..the intruder is..guilty of the more serious crime of burglary in the second degree [etc.]. 1976 Times Lit. Suppl. 6 Aug. 998/2 He sticks rigidly to burglary three—breaking into empty apartments in the daytime—since this carries a much less severe rap than burglary one or two. 1985 Financial Times 29 May i. 3 One of the more unusual of Budapest's 1,700 burglaries last year was by a skilled labourer who drove to work in a Mercedes. |
b. As an act: A felonious breaking into a house.
| 1609 W. Barlow Answ. Nameless Cath. 308 The second comming of Christ is resembled to a theeues burghlarie. 1712 in Maidment Sc. Pasquils 438 Like fearful women in burglaries they generally add bloodshed to theft. Mod. The season for burglaries has commenced. |
c. fig.
| 1636 C. Fitzgeffrey Blessed Birthday (1881) 155 To breake into Gods sealed secresie, This is..bold burglary. a 1677 Barrow Serm. I. xxi. (R.) To break open the closet of a man's breast..may well be deemed a worse sort of burglary..than to break open doors. |
▪ II. † ˈburglary2 Obs.
[As if ad. L. burglārius, ad. AF. burgler.]
= burglar n.
| 1533–4 Act 24 Hen. VIII, iii, Diuers and many great arrant robbers, murderers, bulglaries [sic] and felons. 1624 T. Taylor Two Serm. ii. 9 With what severity are the lawes executed upon Burglaries, that breake into mens houses, to rob and spoile? 1651 W. G. tr. Cowel's Inst. 88 Murderers, Robbers, or Burglaries. |
Hence † ˈburglary v. Obs.
| 1598 Florio, Robbachiare, to filch, to pilfer..to burglarie. |