Dictionary

embowel en · VERB

Pronunciation

• (Southern-England) audio
• /ɛmˈbaʊ.əl/

Etymology

From em- + bowel.

Meanings

1. (archaic) To remove the bowels; disembowel.
   • Who doubts that the fineing, whipping, torturing, hanging, embowelling of men, women, and children, guilty of no other crime than adhesion to the Catholic faith, had assisted the Pope and Philip, and their band of English, Scotch, and Irish conspirators, to shake Elizabeth's throne and endanger her life? 1867, John Lothrop Motley, Project Gutenberg History of The Netherlands, 1555–1623, Complete:
   • […] So had given no direction about his body. I have cauſed it to be embowelled, and depoſited in a vault, till I have orders from England. 1748, [Samuel Richardson], “Letter CXIII”, in Clarissa. Or, The History of a Young Lady: […], volume VII, London: […] S[amuel] Richardson; [a]nd sold by John Osborn, […], →OCLC, page 415:
   • As to that part of the sentence which relates to embowelling, it was never executed now, but this omission was owing to accident, or to the mercy of the executioner, not to the discretion of the judge. " 1913, Henry W. Nevinson, Essays in Rebellion:
2. (obsolete) To enclose or bury.
   • [H]e therefore hastened on, and conducted Carlstadt to the spot he had recently quitted, and discovered to him a rude mishapen entrance to a flight of steps, which appeared as conducting ones to some dwelling emboweled in the earth. 1807, [Miss Guion], chapter II, in The Three Germans. Mysteries Exemplified in the Life of Holstein of Lutztein. A German Romance. […], volume I, London: […] J[ames] F[letcher] Hughes, […], →OCLC, pages 31–32:

Forms

Deriveds

envowel

Synonyms

embed (enclose) · enclose (enclose) · inclose (enclose) · bury (enclose) · eviscerate (remove the bowels) · disembowel (remove the bowels)