incarcerare

Incarcerare is an Italian verb meaning to imprison or incarcerate. It is a transitive verb used in legal, penal, and formal contexts to place someone in prison or confinement.

Etymology: The word comes from Latin incarcera-re, based on carcer meaning “prison,” with the prefix in- indicating confinement. Cognates occur in several Romance languages, such as Spanish encarcelar and French incarcérer, and the English noun incarceration is related.

Conjugation and forms: Incarcerare is a regular first-conjugation verb (-are). The participle is incarcerato, the gerund incarcerando, and the related noun is incarcerazione. It follows standard -are verb patterns in Italian.

Usage: Incarcerare denotes the act of placing someone in prison or under formal detention. It is common in legal, judicial, and institutional discourse. In everyday Italian, other verbs such as imprigionare or detenere may be used to describe imprisonment or detention in more colloquial or varied contexts.

Examples:

- La corte ha deciso di incarcerare il sospettato. (The court decided to incarcerate the suspect.)

- La legge permette di incarcerare i sospetti in attesa del processo.

See also: Incarceration, carcer, incarcerato.