Definition
Incroachment is an archaic spelling variant of ENCROACHMENT. Both terms refer to the unlawful gaining upon the right or possession of another — that is, an intrusion into land, rights, or privileges belonging to someone else without legal authority. The term carries no independent legal meaning distinct from encroachment; it appears in older legal texts solely as an alternate orthographic form. Researchers encountering incroachment in historical sources should treat it as functionally identical to encroachment and consult that entry for substantive analysis.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Archaic form of encroachment.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): Webster's 1913 does not carry a separate entry for incroachment, listing encroachment as the standard form.
The gap here is orthographic rather than semantic. Common and legal usage align entirely — the term simply fell out of standard spelling practice. Its appearance in a legal document signals an older source, not a different concept.
Common Confusion
INCROACHMENT vs. ENCROACHMENT: These are the same term. No distinction in meaning exists between them. Incroachment is the older spelling; encroachment is the modern standard. Researchers should not infer any substantive legal difference from the variant spelling. Some older courts and treatise writers used both forms interchangeably within the same document.
Why It Matters in Research
The primary research value of this entry is recognition: encountering incroachment in a historical source should not send a researcher down a false trail. It is not a separate cause of action, a distinct doctrine, or a term of art with specialized meaning. It is encroachment, spelled as it commonly appeared before orthographic standardization settled on the modern form.
Researchers working in pre-nineteenth-century English common law materials, colonial American records, or early American case law and statutes will encounter incroachment with some regularity. The shift to the standardized spelling encroachment was gradual and inconsistent across jurisdictions. A full-text search of historical corpora limited to one spelling will miss sources using the other; any corpus search for encroachment doctrine in materials predating approximately 1850 should run both spellings.
Black's Law Dictionary and Rapalje & Lawrence both flag the term only to redirect to encroachment, which confirms that even the historical legal lexicographers treated it as nothing more than a spelling variant. Neither source attempts to assign incroachment a distinct legal character.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary and Rapalje & Lawrence are in complete agreement: both define incroachment solely as "an unlawful gaining upon the right or possession of another" and immediately cross-reference encroachment. Neither dictionary provides a substantive definition under this heading. The editorial choice to include the entry at all reflects the compilers' recognition that the spelling was sufficiently common in historical legal materials to warrant a redirect entry — but nothing more. No historical legal dictionary in the Law Mind corpus assigns incroachment an independent definition or treats it as meaningfully distinct from its modern counterpart.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: Encroachment (primary reference for all substantive doctrine); Trespass (for overlap between encroachment and trespass theories in property law); Property Rights (for the broader framework within which encroachment claims arise).