1. In various senses of the verb. a. † Entangled. b. † Obliged, attached by gratitude. c. Locked in fight. d. That is under a promise to marry; betrothed.
1615. G. Sandys, Trav., 137. The sands … with a lingring cruelty swallowed the ingaged.
1665. Walton, Life Hooker, I. 99. Not as an engaged person, but indifferently.
1673. Vain Insolency of Rome, 12. Your engaged well wishing Friend and Servant.
1692. Locke, Toleration, III. iii. This … is … like an engaged Enemy, to vent one’s Spleen upon a Party.
1719. De Foe, Crusoe (ed. 3), I. 247. Never Man had a more faithful, loving, sincere Servant than Friday was to me;… perfectly oblig’d and engag’d.
18[?]. Dickens, Edwin Drood, iii. It is so absurd to be an engaged orphan.
Mod. At a certain party last week, there were six engaged couples.
2. a. Arch. Engaged column, one partly let into a wall in the rear. Engaged tower (see quot.). b. Mech. Engaged wheels, wheels in gear with each other. The driver is the engaging wheel, and the follower is the wheel engaged.
1847. Engl. Ecclesiology, 154. Of the quadrangular tower there are two varieties: the one where it is engaged, i. e. has the aisles flush with its western face.
1867. A. Barry, Sir C. Barry, ii. 51. Engaged columns—colonnades walled up.
1880. C. T. Newton, Ess. Art & Archæol., iii. 83. A Doric peristyle with engaged columns.
1882. Athenæum, No. 2859. 212. The later pillars of the nave … are accompanied by eight engaged shafts. Ibid. (1886), 21 Aug., 248/1. The church at Acton possesses what is called an engaged tower.
Hence † Engagedly adv. Obs., in an engaged or interested manner; with the feeling of a partisan.
1654. R. Whitlock, Ζωοτομια, 233 (T.). Engagedly biassed to one side or the other.
