elopement
Americannoun
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elopements
plural
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an act or instance of running off secretly, especially to be married.
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an act or instance of a patient or person in care leaving a hospital, care facility, or safe area independently without notifying anyone.
Nursing homes need strategies to cope with elopement.
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a small wedding ceremony with few or no guests and often without a reception.
The couple had a quiet elopement in Dublin with only their parents and an officiant present.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of elopement
First recorded in 1600–10; elope ( def. ) + -ment ( def. )
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.
See Examples For:
The Janet Jackson that “Control” unleashed on the world was a teenager shaking off the dust of two forgettable pop albums and a misguided elopement with another pop star, James DeBarge, when she was 18.
From Salon ● Apr. 11, 2026
Mae changed the game — her elopement adventures took people wherever they wanted to go, giving them permission to have whatever kind of ceremony they desired.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 6, 2025
His therapists are working to address elopement or wandering that can be common in children with autism.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 16, 2023
Dear Miss Manners: My daughter and her fiance are having a planned elopement.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 9, 2023
The signs of our elopement were subtle: My parents’ wedding picture was gone, as was the grainy photograph of my grandfather and King Nader Shah standing over the dead deer.
From "The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini
During the elopements, her husband Bill takes photos via drone and shoots video.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 6, 2025
During the pandemic, many weddings turned into elopements.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 23, 2023
Some look like elopements or first-time trips for nervous couples; others look like tearful reunions or contemplative solo journeys.
From Slate ● Feb. 24, 2021
Mary Ellen’s father, Thomas Love Peacock, had been close to the poet Shelley, whose life, writes Johnson, “was a harried one of bailiffs, angry parents, elopements, death, delusion, passion, semi-madness, wife-sharing, and suicides.”
From Washington Post ● Jul. 22, 2020
Who that rides on a railway car ever hears anything about elopements or such romances!
From Stage-coach and Tavern Days by Alice Morse Earle
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.
