【Imprison】 , 【incarcerate】 ,  【jail】 ,  【immure】 ,  【intern】  mean to confine closely so that escape is impossible or unlikely. The first three words  【imprison】 , 【incarcerate】 , 【jail】  imply a shutting up in or as if in a prison,  【imprison】  being the general term,  【incarcerate】  the bookish or journalistic term, and  【jail】  the common word.

Distinctively,  【imprison】 implies seizure and detention in custody and is applicable even when the one confined is not in a prison or 【jail】 or suffering a penalty.

【Incarcerate】 implies a shutting up in or as if in a prison cell.

【Jail】  may be preferred to  【incarcerate】 as a simpler and more generally intelligible term. Often, however,  【jail】  , the verb, following  【jail】  , the noun, in its accepted sense connotes imprisonment in a building in which persons are held for short periods, either paying the penalty for minor offenses or for the purpose of awaiting legal proceedings.

【Immure】 is a literary rather than technical term. When it implies punishment for a crime, it may connote burial alive within a wall; usually, however, the term suggests restriction to closely confined quarters typically as a captive or a devotee to duty or to religion.

【Intern】 is used chiefly of military or wartime conditions; it seldom implies incarceration and usually suggests a keeping within prescribed limits (as in a guarded camp) and under severe restraints.