ENTA'IL, noun 1. An estate or fee entailed, or limited indescent to a particular heir or heirs. Estates-tail are general, as when lands and tenements are given to one and the heirs of his body begotten; or special, as when lands and tenements are given to one and the heirs of his body by a particular wife. 2. Rule of descent settled for an estate. 3. Engraver's work; inlay. ENTA'IL, verb transitive To settle the descent of lands and tenements, by gift to a man and to certain heirs specified, so that neither the donee nor any subsequent possessor can alienate or bequeath it; as, to entail a manor to AB and to his eldest son, or to his heirs of his body begotten, or to his heirs by a particular wife. 1. To fix unalienably on a person or thing, or on a person and his descendants. By the apostasy misery is supposed to be entailed on mankind. The intemperate often entail infirmities, diseases and ruin on their children. 2. [from the French verb.] To cut; to carve for ornament.
Source: Webster's 1828 American Dictionary ↗ · public-domain · returned verbatim, no AI