dining hall
Americannoun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of dining hall
First recorded in 1660–70
Explanation
A dining-hall is a large space where many people eat at the same time. If you go to college and live in a dormitory, you'll probably eat most of your meals in a dining-hall. You can use the word dining-hall when you're talking about a cafeteria or another group space for eating. You'll find dining-halls at universities, camps. and boarding schools. The word hall. a long room, comes from the Old English root heall, "spacious roofed residence," and dining is rooted in the Old French disner, "to have a meal."
Vocabulary lists containing dining-hall
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Often, I’ll spot someone I half-know across the dining hall and then stand there doing the mental math.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jul. 7, 2026
“It’s normal to see them in the dining hall and gym. Sometimes, I stop and have interesting conversations.”
From The Wall Street Journal • May 30, 2026
“In most CCRCs, when you go down to the dining hall, half the people have walkers or canes. In the promotional literature, you don’t see that at all,” Horowitz said.
From MarketWatch • May 8, 2026
Correctional officers removed more than 150 incarcerated women from their cells and confined them in a dining hall while conducting a search of their housing unit, the complaint alleges.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 28, 2026
Everyone in the dining hall was staring at Conor now.
From "A Monster Calls" by Patrick Ness
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
