prisoner's base

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noun

any of various children's games in which each of two teams has a home base where members of the opposing team are kept prisoner after being tagged or caught and from which they can be freed only in specified ways.

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Also called prison base .

Origin of prisoner's base

1590–1600; compare late Middle English bace prisoner's base, perhaps from the phrase bringen bas to lay low, cause to surrender; later taken as an assimilated form of bars, plural of bar¹, or as base¹ (though the sense “goal or starting point” originated with this game)

Words nearby prisoner's base

prismoid, prison, prison camp, prisoner, prisoner of war, prisoner's base, prisoner's dilemma, prison fever, prison pallor, prison psychosis, prison rustic work

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2022

How to use prisoner's base in a sentence

And now, similarly, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee: "Bend over and take it like a prisoner!"
Huckabee 2016: Bend Over and Take It Like a Prisoner!|Olivia Nuzzi|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Paperback publishers distributed their titles in African-American neighborhoods because it expanded their market base.
How Pulp Fiction Saved Literature|Wendy Smith|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Clickbait title notwithstanding, Bend Over and Take It Like a Prisoner!
Huckabee 2016: Bend Over and Take It Like a Prisoner!|Olivia Nuzzi|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
If ISIS “came into a base and killed hundreds of troops, then people would ask a lot more questions.”
Pentagon Doesn’t Know How Many People It’s Killed in the ISIS War|Nancy A. Youssef|January 7, 2015|DAILY BEAST

Huckabee will also need to establish a reliable fundraising base, something that up until now has proved to be elusive.
Can Huckabee Convert the GOP’s Moneymen?|Lloyd Green|January 4, 2015|DAILY BEAST
The upper part of the stem is usually unbranched, but whorls of branches occur towards the base.
How to Know the Ferns|S. Leonard Bastin
Ajoutez cecy, s'il vous plaist, la grande difficult qu'il y a de tirer d'eux les mots mesmes qu'ils ont.
The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, Vol. II: Acadia, 1612-1614|Various
They also seized the lake gunboats, took an entire Spanish garrison prisoner, and captured a large quantity of stores.
The Philippine Islands|John Foreman
It is a vile world because it is an under-educated world, unreasonable, suspicious, base and ferocious.
The Salvaging Of Civilisation|H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
Neantmoins le vieil Membertou, pere du malade, conceut asss l'affaire, et me promit qu'on s'arresteroit tout ce que j'en dirois.
The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, Vol. II: Acadia, 1612-1614|Various

British Dictionary definitions for prisoner's base

prisoner's base

noun

a children's game involving two teams, members of which chase and capture each other to increase the number of children in their own base

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