Other forms: engrossing, engrossed, engrosses
To engross is to take up somebody's whole attention. Engrossed in a book, wholly engrossed, engross the reader.
It is used almost entirely in the passive: people are engrossed in things rather than things engrossing people. In law it has a quite separate technical sense — to engross a document is to prepare the final formal copy for signing.
1verbengrossTo take up somebody's whole attention.
“She was so engrossed in her book that she missed her bus stop.”
engross is an absorbing.
Anglo-Norman engrosser meant to write large or to buy wholesale, from en gros, in bulk.
Proto-Indo-European
*ghrewə- — to fell, put down, fall in
Proto-Germanic
*grautaz — large, great, thick, coarse grained, unrefined
Proto-West Germanic
*graut
Old High German
grōz — big, thick, coarse
Medieval Latin
ingrossō — thicken, write something large and in bold lettering
Anglo-Norman
engrosser — to gather in large quantities, draft something in final form
Middle English
engrossen
English, today
engross
Built from
From Middle English engrossen, from Anglo-Norman engrosser (“to gather in large quantities, draft something in final form”); partly from the phrase en gros (“in bulk, in quantity, at wholesale”), from en- + gros; and partly from Medieval Latin ingrossō (“thicken, write something large and in bold lettering”), from in- + grossus (“great, big, thick”), from Old High German grōz (“big, thick, coarse”), from Proto-West Germanic graut, from Proto-Germanic grautaz (“large, great, thick, coarse grained, unrefined”), from Proto-Indo-European ghrewə- (“to fell, put down, fall in”). More at in-, gross. by surface analysis, en- + gross.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA