Word.ws English Dictionary

exclave

/ˈɛkskleɪv/

exclave noun: a portion of a country's territory not connected to the main part.

Noun

exclave (plural exclaves)

  1. A portion of a country's territory not connected to the main part.
    • Alaska and Kaliningrad are both examples of exclaves.
    • While there has never been a macronational bedroom nation, some exclaves have been barely larger.2006 March 24, r, “World's smallest enclave?”, in Micro-Nations.com (MNO), archived from the original on 10 Aug 2008
  2. (rare) A detached part of an organ, as of the pancreas, thyroid (accessory thyroids), or other gland.

Verb

exclave (third-person singular simple present exclaves, present participle exclaving, simple past and past participle exclaved)

  1. (transitive) To separate a region in a way that turns it into an exclave.

exclave meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Indonesian and Thai

exclave in Tamil

பிரித்தவுறுப்புப் பகுதி

exclave in Urdu

گھرا ہوا خطہ, محصور علاقہ

exclave in Indonesian

a country's territory not connected to the main part
eksklave

exclave in Thai

a country's territory not connected to the main part
ดินแดนส่วนแยก din-dɛɛn-sùuan-yɛ̂ɛk

Examples of exclave in a sentence

  • Spain’s Melilla, one of two small exclaves of EU land on the African continent, has long been the strongest distillation of fortress Europe.2022 March 10, Daniel Howden, “Europe has rediscovered compassion for refugees – but only if they’re white”, in The Guardian, archived from...
  • France, but the shape of a giraffe, with a number of its counties belonging to Wales, with an odd little exclave far up North in Norway?2022 August 24, Ruth Cassidy, “Crusader Kings 3 update looks to tone-down the 'border gore' of endless conquest”, in PC Gamer, archived...

Forms of exclave

Noun
pluralexclaves
Verb
third-person singular presentexclaves
present participleexclaving
past participleexclaved
pastexclaved

Origin of exclave

From ex- + (en)clave.

Questions about exclave

What does exclave mean?
Exclave means a portion of a country's territory not connected to the main part.
What is exclave in Tamil?
Exclave in Tamil is பிரித்தவுறுப்புப் பகுதி. See Exclave meaning in Tamil.
How do you use exclave in a sentence?
Spain’s Melilla, one of two small exclaves of EU land on the African continent, has long been the strongest distillation of fortress Europe.
What part of speech is exclave?
Exclave can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce exclave?
Exclave is pronounced /ˈɛkskleɪv/.
What is the plural of exclave?
The plural of exclave is exclaves.

Words near exclave in the dictionary

  1. exclaming
  2. exclams
  3. exclaustrated
  4. exclaustration
  5. exclaustrations
  6. exclave
  7. exclaved
  8. exclaves
  9. exclaving
  10. exclay
  11. exclinate

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: exclave (page history and authors); exclave (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); exclave (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-exclave.ogg.

Cite this entry: “exclave.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/exclave. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.