[f. as prec. + -MENT.]
1. The action or process of enriching, in various senses; the condition of being enriched.
a. 1626. Bacon, Holy War, Wks. VII. (1859), 14. Not without great and ample additions, and enrichment thereof.
1625. Markham (title), The Inrichment of the Weald of Kent.
1665. Manley, Grotius’ Low-C. Warrs, 247. To behave themselves valiantly … would not onely be for their everlasting Honour, but Enrichment.
1724. Watts, Logic, I. vi. § 1. A vast hindrance to the enrichment of our understandings.
1748. Anson, Voy., I. i. 8. It was not principally intended for the enrichment of the Agents.
1875. Whitney, Life Lang., vii. 120. Material … which nevertheless furnishes notable enrichment to speech.
1876. Green, Short Hist., vii. § 1. 342. The smaller gentry shared in the general enrichment of the landed proprietors.
b. concr. A means of enriching; an addition of wealth.
1649. Blithe, Eng. Improv. Impr. (1653), 45. He [the merchant] fetches it from farre, and tis a gallant Inrichment to this Nation.
2. spec. The imparting of ‘richness’ of effect by decorative additions. Also concr. in sing. and in pl., the ornament used for enriching a building, etc.
1664. Evelyn, trans. Freart’s Archit. (R.). Neither did they often fill the pedestals with relieuo … and rarely euer allow the corona any enrichment.
1708. [E. Hatton], New View Lond., I. 101/2. A large Column … having Enrichments of Fruit, Leaves, [etc.].
1837. Whittock, Bk. Trades (1842), 231. Filigree working is a kind of enrichment on gold or silver.
1864. Boutell, Heraldry Hist. & Pop., xix. 316. The Effigy of Edward II., at Gloucester, still retains, almost uninjured, its sculptured enrichments.
