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American Dictionary of the English Language

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Empale


EMPA'LE, verb transitive [Latin palus.]

1. To fence or fortify with stakes; to set a line of stakes or posts for defense.

All that dwell near enemies empale villages, to save themselves from surprise.

[We now use stockade, in a like sense.]

2. To inclose; to surround.

Round about her work she did empale

With a fair border wrought of sundry flowers.

3. To inclose; to shut in.

Impenetrable, empal'd with circling fire.

4. To thrust a stake up the fundament, and thus put to death; to put to death by fixing on a stake; a punishment formerly practiced in Rome, and still used in Turkey.