innkeeper
Americannoun
-
innkeepers
plural
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of innkeeper
Explanation
An innkeeper is someone who owns or manages an inn. When you arrive at an inn, the innkeeper might be the person who checks you in and gives you a key to your room (and maybe a chocolate on your pillow). The earliest innkeepers ran inns in Europe during medieval times. These inns provided lodging, food, and a place for travelers to leave their horses, and an innkeeper managed all of these details. Today in the UK, some pubs call themselves inns, so you might find an innkeeper serving pints there, while in the US an inn is almost always a more charming version of a motel, run by an innkeeper.
Vocabulary lists containing innkeeper
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:
“I believe everything out of the common,” says the innkeeper.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 23, 2025
“I have fireplaces flying forward,” said Olivia Cobian, the innkeeper at the Gingerbread Mansion, a bed-and-breakfast in the historic town of Ferndale, as sirens wailed in the background Thursday morning.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 5, 2024
But Ms. Rolikova, the innkeeper, thought it was important to see it, and so she opened the padlocked door to reveal a palimpsest of Russia over the past century.
From New York Times ● Aug. 6, 2023
Audience members also got a glimpse of Olivia Colman as a Cockney innkeeper and Sally Hawkins as Wonka's mother.
From BBC ● Apr. 28, 2023
The innkeeper scowls, but I'm already pulling up a stool to the table for the flame-haired boy.
From "The Inquisitor's Tale" by Adam Gidwitz
For a number of years, the marathon included both a racing and touring division and featured refueling stops with delectable fare provided by local innkeepers and restaurateurs.
From New York Times ● Mar. 2, 2023
A couple in upstate New York became impromptu innkeepers for South Korean tourists over the weekend after the visitors became stranded in an intense blizzard.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 26, 2022
As part of the job, the innkeepers will receive a healthcare plan and two weeks of vacation, with room and board included.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 20, 2022
Most of the masks in the game are acquired through earning badges by performing tasks for some of the people Sable meets along her journey — innkeepers, machinists, etc.
From Washington Post ● Oct. 1, 2021
He had given letters to the innkeepers everywhere, and they had promised to send them on.
From "The Once and Future King" by T. H. White
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.
