bastille

Meaning

Noun

1. Chiefly in French contexts: a bastion (“projecting part of a rampart or other fortification”) or tower of a castle; also, a fortified tower or other building; or a small citadel or fortress.
2. A jail or prison, especially one regarded as mistreating its prisoners.
3. Synonym of workhouse (“an institution for homeless poor people funded by the local parish, where the able-bodied were required to work”)
4. The fortified encampment of an army besieging a place; also, any of the buildings in such an encampment.

Verb

To confine (someone or something) in, or as if in, a bastille (noun sense 2.1) or prison; to imprison.

Synonyms

jail

cage

bagnio

limbo

bastile

pogey

pogy

pogie

prison

prison house

gaol

jailhouse

hoosgow

penitentiary

pokey

poky

presidio

solidness

stranglehold

sturdiness

chokey

cell

choky

clink

confinement

fixity

firmness

hold

brig

Translations

prison

Gefängnis

απόφαση

Βαστίλη

bastille

fermeté

prigione

risolutezza

determinazione

resolutio

gevangenis

donjon

cadeia

Hyphenated as

bast‧ille

Pronounced as (IPA)

/bæˈstiːl/

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English: bastile

Cognate with French: bastille

In summary

The noun is derived from Middle English bastile, bastel (“fortification for attack mounted on a barge or wheels; projecting part of a fortification, bastion, turret; fortified encampment of a besieging army; structure carrying armed men on an elephant’s back; (figuratively) refuge, shelter; protector”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman bastile, bastille, Middle French bastille, and Old French baastel, basstel (“fortification; fortified tower; temporary fortification constructed for attack or defence; (small) castle or fortress”) (modern French bastille; compare Medieval Latin bastīle), from bastide (“fortification; fortress”) with the ending modified after nouns ending in -ille (from Latin -īle (suffix forming place names)). Bastide is derived from Old Occitan bastida (“fortification; (Provence) country mansion”), from bastir (“to build, construct”) + -ida (suffix forming nouns); while bastir is from *bastīre, from Frankish *bastijan (“to sew; to weave”), from Proto-West Germanic *bast (“fibre; rope”), from Proto-Germanic *bastaz (“fibre; rope”); further etymology uncertain, perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *bʰask- ~ *bʰasḱ- (“bundle, heap, load”) but this is disputed.
Sense 2.1 (“jail or prison, especially one regarded as mistreating its prisoners”) is from the Bastille in Paris, France. Known in full as the Bastille Saint-Antoine, it was a former fortress used as a prison by the French monarchy in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Bastille was stormed by a crowd on 14 July 1789 at the start of the French Revolution and later demolished, becoming an important symbol for the French Republican movement.
Sense 2.2 (“workhouse”) was possibly popularized by the English politician William Cobbett (1763–1835) who opposed the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834 (4 & 5 William IV, chapter 76; often called the “New Poor Law”). This Act made relief or welfare for poor people only available through workhouses, and ensured that the working conditions were harsh so that only the truly destitute would apply for relief.
The verb is derived from the noun.
cognates
* Late Latin bastile (“wooden siege tower”), bastilla, bastillia, bastillus, bastellum (“fortification; wooden siege tower”)