Word.ws English Dictionary

purpresture

purpresture noun: the unlawful personal appropriation of public lands; wrongful encroachment on, or enclosure of properties belonging to the public (e.g. highways, sidewalks, forests, harbors).

Noun

purpresture (countable and uncountable, plural purprestures)

  1. (historical) The unlawful personal appropriation of public lands; wrongful encroachment on, or enclosure of properties belonging to the public (e.g. highways, sidewalks, forests, harbors).

Forms of purpresture

pluralpurprestures
alternative formpourpresture

Origin of purpresture

From 1150–1200, Middle English purpresture, from Anglo-Norman purpresture; alteration of Old French porpresure (“enclosure, occupied space”), from porprendre (“to seize, occupy, enclose”), from por- (“for”) + prendre (“to take”); from Latin prehendere.

Questions about purpresture

What does purpresture mean?
Purpresture means the unlawful personal appropriation of public lands; wrongful encroachment on, or enclosure of properties belonging to the public (e.g. highways, sidewalks, forests, harbors).
What part of speech is purpresture?
Purpresture is a noun.
What is the plural of purpresture?
The plural of purpresture is purprestures.

Words near purpresture in the dictionary

  1. purposivist
  2. purposivistic
  3. purposivists
  4. purposivity
  5. purpre
  6. purpresture
  7. purprestures
  8. purprise
  9. purprises
  10. purpronin
  11. purpura

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: purpresture (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.

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