anchorite
[ang-kuh-rahyt]
noun
a person who has retired to a solitary place for a life of religious seclusion; hermit.
Also anchoret.
Origin of anchorite
1400–50; late Middle English anc(h)orite, conflation of Middle English ancre (Old English ancra, ancer) and Old French anacorite or Medieval Latin anachōrīta < Late Greek anachōrētḗs, equivalent to Greek anachōrē-, stem of anachōreîn to withdraw (ana- ana- + chōreîn to give way, verbal derivative of chôros space) + -tēs agent suffix; Old English forms < Old Irish *ancharae < Late Latin anachōrēta < Late Greek
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019
Related Words for anchorite
priest, abbot, friar, sister, hermit, recluse, solitary, cenobite, brother, ascetic, religious, monastic, eremite, vestal, prioress, postulant, abbess, monk, nun, solitaireExamples from the Web for anchorite
Historical Examples of anchorite
He was, to the eyes of men, studious and holy as an anchorite.
The church itself was frequently the habitation of the anchorite.
English VillagesP. H. Ditchfield
Why that man has conversation for the prince and the peasant—the courtier and the anchorite.
Tales And Novels, Volume 9 (of 10)Maria Edgeworth
At the Tambov hermitage the anchorite Hilary, a man of saintly life, has died.
Father SergiusLeo Tolstoy
He lived in Paris more lonely than an anchorite in the deserts of Thebes.
The Moon and SixpenceW. Somerset Maugham
anchorite
noun
Word Origin for anchorite
C15: from Medieval Latin anchorīta, from Late Latin anachōrēta, from Greek anakhōrētēs, from anakhōrein to retire, withdraw, from khōra a space
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper