sanctuary

nouncommon in dialogue

United Kingdom//ˈsæŋktjʊəɹi//
United Kingdom//ˈsæŋkt͡ʃʊəɹi//
United States//ˈsæŋkt͡ʃuˌɛɹi//

A place of safety, refuge, or protection.

noun

1
A place of safety, refuge, or protection.
My car is a sanctuary, where none can disturb me except for people who cut me off.
She saw him, even as she had last gazed upon him, pale, cold, and awful; but still he was there. The coffin was to her like a shrine; all that she held most dear and most precious was within its dark and silent sanctuary.
‘I understand that the district was considered a sort of sanctuary,’ the Chief was saying. ‘An Alsatia like the ancient one behind the Strand, or the Saffron Hill before the First World War.[…]’
In January, federal agents indicted 16 sanctuary leaders from Texas and Arizona on charges of helping to harbor illegal immigrants from Central America.
2
An area set aside for protection.
The bird sanctuary has strict restrictions on visitors so the birds aren't disturbed.
3
A state of being protected, asylum.
The government granted sanctuary to the defector, protecting him from his former government.
4
The consecrated (or sacred) area of a church or temple around its tabernacle or altar.
Near-synonym: chancel (broadly synonymous)

Etymology

From Middle English seyntuarie, from Old French saintuaire, from Late Latin sanctuarium (“a sacred place, a shrine, a private cabinet, in Medieval Latin also temple, church, churchyard, cemetery, right of asylum”), from Latin sanctus (“holy, sacred”); see saint.

Forms

plural: sanctuaries

San · Any of the foraging non-Bantu ethnic groups of southwestern…Sanchez · A surname from Spanish [in turn originating as a patronymic];…Sancho · A male given name from Spanish.

sanctuary · A place of safety, refuge, or protection.

sand · Rock that is ground more finely than gravel, but is not as…sanders · sandalwood, especially the red sandalwood Sanders · A surname originating as a patronymic

The neighbouring pages — Alphabetical order follows the rules of the language, not byte values: an accent decides only between two otherwise identical words, and Spanish files Ñ as a letter of its own.