boxed

1. 1
   adjective

   Packed inside a box or set of boxes.

   The warehouse stored hundreds of boxed appliances ready for shipping.

   She prefers boxed wine for casual weeknight dinners.

   Similarpackaged, packed, crated

   Oppositeunpacked, loose

2. 2
   verb

   Past tense and past participle of box.

   The volunteers boxed donations throughout the afternoon.

   He had boxed professionally before becoming a coach.

   Note

   A regular -ed form, so one spelling covers both the past tense and the participle that follows have or be. It carries every sense of the verb: boxed in for cornered or hemmed in, pipes boxed behind boarding, a tree boxed for its sap, paint boxed so two cans match exactly. Placed before a noun, the participle shades into the adjective for packed goods.

3. 3
   adjective

   Of a pack of playing cards: having become reversed so that some cards lie face up and others face down within the same pack.

   A boxed pack can cause confusion, since players glimpse cards that should stay hidden.

   She realized the deck was boxed when several cards flashed their faces during the shuffle.

   Note

   A card-table term from bridge and similar games. It is said of the whole pack, usually after the verb (the pack is boxed), rather than of a single card, and it allows no degrees: a pack is never more or less boxed. Keep it apart from the packaging sense, because a boxed pack here has nothing to do with its carton.

4. 4
   adjective

   Of domesticated animals: having become mixed together, where previously separate flocks or herds combine either by accident or on purpose.

   The drover swore when he saw the cattle boxed with another station's herd.

   Heavy rain washed out the fences and left the sheep hopelessly boxed.

   Similarmixed

   Note

   An Australian word from the world of livestock. It describes the animals themselves, not any container: flocks or herds that should stay apart end up boxed, whether by accident or by design. It often takes with to name the other group, as in cattle boxed with a neighbor's herd. Like the card-table sense, it concerns things mixed that belong apart.

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