hermitage
noun
the habitation of a hermit.
hermitage
1
British
/ ˈhɜːmɪtɪdʒ /
noun
-
the abode of a hermit
-
any place where a person may live in seclusion; retreat
Hermitage
2
British
/ ˈhɜːmɪtɪdʒ /
noun
Hermitage
3
British
/ ˈhɜːmɪtɪdʒ /
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of hermitage
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English, from Old French; see hermit, eremite, -age
Explanation
Your summer cabin deep in the woods where you go to think about how funny life is sometimes? If you want to sound fancy, it could be called a hermitage, a dwelling removed from civilization. The noun hermitage has origins in the French word hermite, meaning “hermit,” a person who lives alone, far from society. Hermitage can describe the place where a hermit lives, or a dwelling occupied by an isolated religious group that prefers solitude. But the word is likely to be used more broadly to describe a secluded or remote dwelling, a place of solitude, where you won’t run into a neighbor while mowing the lawn in the backyard.
Vocabulary lists containing hermitage
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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 manuscript opens with the life of Giovanni of Florence, who built the Augustinian hermitage of Santa Lucia in Larniano with help from local farmers.
From Science Daily ● Feb. 2, 2026
Unless somebody at Google HQ has just made a fix, Google Maps will tell you incorrectly that the hermitage and lodge are beyond the road closure.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 29, 2025
The hermitage was his summer hideaway, a place for monthslong vacations with family and friends.
From New York Times ● Mar. 15, 2024
Its artefacts and antiquities consultant Nigel Mills suggested the cross could have been connected with the medieval hermitage and chapel at Throckenholt, which is within the Sutton St Edmund parish.
From BBC ● Mar. 5, 2022
For it was in this pool that the Hermit looked when he wanted to know what was going on in the world outside the green walls of his hermitage.
From "The Horse and His Boy" by C.S. Lewis
Kent Police said it had charged Aaron Turner, 22, from Hermitage Road in Higham, after the fatal crash near Gravesend on Sunday.
From BBC ● Sep. 9, 2026
Even at the New Camaldoli Hermitage, a Benedictine monastery above Lucia, the road’s reopening and coming summer season have made a difference.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 4, 2026
They are now regular visitors to the grand Hermitage Museum, housed in the former palace of the Tsars.
From Barron's ● Feb. 18, 2026
In 1892, the Finnish Art Society sent her to St. Petersburg, Russia, to paint copies of works in the Hermitage and then, in 1894, to Vienna and Florence to copy old masters.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 3, 2026
In 1862, when Nashville fell to Union forces in the Civil War, Union soldiers visited the Hermitage.
From "In the Shadow of Liberty" by Kenneth C. Davis
These ascetics attracted followers, and as a result monasteries and hermitages flourished in less hospitable areas.
From Textbooks ● Apr. 19, 2023
Lizz Pickard of Colorado is staying at one of the hermitages at Solas Bride this week, the latest of several visits.
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 1, 2023
His companions were genuine lay brothers, able to lead him through the marshes and waterways to isolated hermitages and priories, where he would be able to plan his next moves.
From BBC ● Dec. 26, 2020
In 1925, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, Turkey’s first president, closed all the orders and hermitages as part of his secularization policies.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 11, 2019
Some evil has to be done with the good, unless we’re going back to pillories and hermitages, to keep ourselves unspotted from the world.
From The Carleton Case by Ellery H. Clark
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.
