stronghold

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English strong-hold, also strong holde,^[2][3] formed from English strong + hold (“fortified place, refuge”).^{[4][2][3][5][6]} This second part is the noun in its now archaic sense of a fortified place.^[6][5][7] The noun comes from the verb,^[4] and Old English had heald in some of its other senses.^[4][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A strongly fortified place, or a secure refuge: about 1384, in the early version of the Wycliffite Bible.^[4] The OED's revised entry has antedated the date of about 1425 in the 1989 edition.^[8][4]

Semantic evolution

Etymonline and the Middle English Dictionary also record the word for a place of confinement, Etymonline from about 1400, and the Middle English Dictionary's first example for a fortified place is from about 1475, in Gregory's Chronicle, with "townys and castellys, abbeys, and strong-holdys".^[5][2] From 1532, in a sermon by J. Fisher, it was used figuratively for a place where a cause or belief is strongly upheld;^[4] the 1989 edition of the OED had dated this to 1535.^[8] American dictionaries separate two figurative uses, a place of last survival, as in the "strongholds of the ancient Gaelic language" that Merriam-Webster Unabridged quotes, and a place dominated by one group or faction.^[3][9][10] Into the 19th century it was often written as two words.^[5]

Timeline

• c. 1384 – a fortified place or secure refuge.^[4]
• c. 1400 – a place of confinement.^[5]
• 1532 – figurative, a place where a cause or belief is strongly upheld.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A place fortified against attack; a fortress.^{[10][6][3][4]}
2. A place of security, refuge or survival: one of the last strongholds of the red squirrel.^[10][3][9]
3. A place dominated by a particular group or marked by a particular view; a major centre of support: a Liberal stronghold.^{[10][6][3][9]}

Related words

• strong
• hold

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
7. ^ Mayhew, A. L.; Skeat, Walter W. (1888), A Concise Dictionary of Middle English from A.D. 1150 to 1580, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
10. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin