recluse
[noun rek-loos, ri-kloos; adjective ri-kloos, rek-loos]
- a person who lives in seclusion or apart from society, often for religious meditation.
- Also incluse. a religious voluntary immured in a cave, hut, or the like, or one remaining within a cell for life.
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- shut off or apart from the world; living in seclusion, often for religious reasons.
- characterized by seclusion; solitary.
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Origin of recluse
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for recluse
Contemporary Examples
Lee is not a recluse, but she famously stopped granting interviews in 1964.
Harper Lee Makes a Surprise Appearance at an Alabama Literary LuncheonMary McDonagh Murphy
May 3, 2012
He was not a recluse, however, as the documents and electronic chips recovered by the SEALs from his lair revealed.
The affront so hurt Allan that he became a Beverly Hills recluse, and died in 1999 of liver cancer at the age of 62.
But Uchitel became a heavy drug user and, increasingly, a recluse in his sprawling Anchorage estate.
Renato: I would either still be designing or living as a recluse in Europe throwing pottery.
Historical Examples
"It is a long time when it is a year of suspense," said the recluse, shaking his head.
Night and Morning, CompleteEdward Bulwer-Lytton
She did not work as devotedly as she had hoped to do, nor did she become a recluse from society.
One Day's CourtshipRobert Barr
He was however naturally of an abstemious and recluse disposition.
ImogenWilliam Godwin
It was Father Sergius's sixth year as a recluse, and he was now forty-nine.
Father SergiusLeo Tolstoy
I am a recluse, have been for many years and rarely stir abroad.
Rosinante to the Road AgainJohn Dos Passos
recluse
- a person who lives in seclusion
- a person who lives in solitude to devote himself to prayer and religious meditation; a hermit, anchorite, or anchoress
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- solitary; retiring
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Word Origin
C13: from Old French reclus, from Late Latin reclūdere to shut away, from Latin re- + claudere to close
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
Word Origin and History for recluse
n.
c.1200, "person shut up from the world for purposes of religious meditation," from Old French reclus (fem. recluse) "hermit, recluse," also "confinement, prison; convent, monastery," noun use of reclus (adj.) "shut up," from Late Latin reclusus, past participle of recludere "to shut up, enclose" (but in classical Latin "to throw open"), from Latin re-, intensive prefix, + claudere "to shut" (see close (v.)).
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper