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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
engross
verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
so
▪ She'd been so engrossed that she hadn't heard him come in.
▪ She says she usually gets so engrossed that she doesn't hear conversations anywhere near her.
▪ The spawning fish are usually so engrossed in their own activities that will hardly notice the flash going off.
■ NOUN
conversation
▪ He was seemingly engrossed in conversation, although she couldn't see with whom because of the milling crowd round the doorway.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ The murder trial had engrossed the small northern Ohio city for months.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Both these areas of the mind grow rapidly and engross a person's thoughts.
▪ Fifty years later, it provides a remarkably smooth and engrossing ride to its tragic destination.
▪ I was constantly engrossed by the problems of time, space, quality, and the other categories of reason.
▪ Mattie grunted abstractedly, totally engrossed in peering at the various plastic containers and bowls in the refrigerator.
▪ She'd been so engrossed that she hadn't heard him come in.
▪ She waved, but Dawn didn't see her, being too engrossed in stuffing the flowers into a large carrier bag.
▪ Then, discarding me like a broken toy, they clustered around Fred Kowalski, engrossed in baseball cards.
▪ They want to be engrossed by your speech; they want the occasion to be a success.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Engross

Engross \En*gross"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Engrossed; p. pr. & vb. n. Engrossing.] [F., fr. pref. en- (L. in) + gros gross, grosse, n., an engrossed document: cf. OF. engrossir, engroissier, to make thick, large, or gross. See Gross.]

  1. To make gross, thick, or large; to thicken; to increase in bulk or quantity. [Obs.]

    Waves . . . engrossed with mud.
    --Spenser.

    Not sleeping, to engross his idle body.
    --Shak.

  2. To amass. [Obs.]

    To engross up glorious deeds on my behalf.
    --Shak.

  3. To copy or write in a large hand (en gross, i. e., in large); to write a fair copy of in distinct and legible characters; as, to engross a deed or like instrument on parchment.

    Some period long past, when clerks engrossed their stiff and formal chirography on more substantial materials.
    --Hawthorne.

    Laws that may be engrossed on a finger nail.
    --De Quincey.

  4. To seize in the gross; to take the whole of; to occupy the attention completely; to absorb; as, the subject engrossed all his thoughts.

  5. To purchase either the whole or large quantities of, for the purpose of enhancing the price and making a profit; hence, to take or assume in undue quantity, proportion, or degree; as, to engross commodities in market; to engross power.

    Engrossed bill (Legislation), one which has been plainly engrossed on parchment, with all its amendments, preparatory to final action on its passage.

    Engrossing hand (Penmanship), a fair, round style of writing suitable for engrossing legal documents, legislative bills, etc.

    Syn: To absorb; swallow up; imbibe; consume; exhaust; occupy; forestall; monopolize. See Absorb.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
engross

c.1400, "to buy up the whole stock of" (in Anglo-French from c.1300), from Old French en gros "in bulk, in a large quantity, at wholesale," as opposed to en detail. See gross.\n

\nFigurative sense of "absorb the whole attention" is first attested 1709. A parallel engross, meaning "to write (something) in large letters," is from Anglo-French engrosser, from Old French en gros "in large (letters)." Related: Engrossed; engrossing.

Wiktionary
engross

vb. 1 (senseid en finalize)(context transitive now legal English) To write (a document) in large, aesthetic, and legible lettering; to make a finalized copy of. 2 (context transitive business obsolete English) To buy up wholesale, especially to buy the whole supply of (a commodity etc.). 3 (context transitive English) To monopolize; to concentrate (something) in the single possession of someone, especially unfairly. 4 (context transitive English) To completely engage the attention of. 5 (context transitive obsolete English) To thicken; to condense. 6 To make gross, thick, or large; to thicken; to increase in bulk or quantity. 7 (context obsolete English) To amass.

WordNet
engross
  1. v. engross (oneself) fully; "He immersed himself into his studies" [syn: steep, immerse, engulf, plunge, absorb, soak up]

  2. engage or engross wholly; "Her interest in butterflies absorbs her completely" [syn: absorb, engage, occupy]

Usage examples of "engross".

A magnificent, an unforeseen destiny now engrossed him, a destiny owed not wholly to his own merit nor to Angevin contrivance, but also to some happy conjunction of the planets.

Bragadin Asks the Hand of That Young Person for Me--Her Father Refuses, and Sends Her to a Convent--De la Haye--I Lose All my Money at the Faso-table--My Partnership with Croce Replenishes My Purse--Various Incidents The happiness derived from my love had prevented me from attaching any importance to my losses, and being entirely engrossed with the thought of my sweetheart my mind did not seem to care for whatever did not relate to her.

Good things to engross, Near Banbury cross Where Tommy shall go on the nag, He makes no mistake, Buy a Banbury Cake, Books, Pictures, and Banbury Shag.

The inhabitants of Westminster had long laboured under the want of a fish-market, and complained that the price of this species of provision was kept up at an exorbitant rate by the fraudulent combination of a few dealers, who engrossed the whole market at Billingsgate, and destroyed great quantities of fish, in order to enhance the value of those that remained.

Nate and Seth huddled together, both engrossed in the bobwhite quail that Seth painstakingly carved.

He was buried in a bookit was one of those evangelical novels theorizing that God lets some people into heaven but leaves others behindand he seemed fairly engrossed in it, perhaps wondering if he would be in the former group or the latter.

Siva was deeply engrossed in his meditation and was determined to remain engrossed thus for the duration of all the remaining Days of Brahma, until the end of existence itself.

Hal and Old Man sat still, engrossed in the developing situation as shown on the screens of the four scopes that now sat in front of them since Calas had rejoined them.

The dying Caledon was utterly engrossed in writing a will, absentmindedly batting blowflies away from his face and apparently unperturbed by the mass of maggots that squirmed in the cyanosed flesh of what had once been his legs.

His mind was not pre-occupied and engrossed with political contests or with affairs of state.

Faithful gives an engrossing picture of the heroic men and dogs involved in the battle to recapture the island of Guam during WWII.

Selik at her other side, but he was engrossed in the daughter of a Saxon ealdorman beside him.

Engrossed in his inner effort, he trekked after Gar and Fabiana onto the Montlake Bridge.

Every Borrible there must have had at least one eye on Flinthead, every Borrible that is except Bingo and Adolf who had been deeply engrossed in cheering each other with tales of what they were going to do to the Wendles when they got half a chance.

She had hardly been thinking of the young ranger these last weeks, too engrossed was she in setting up her own kingdom and, of late, in rousing Agradeleous and plotting her moves in favor of Wadon.