Asylum Meaning
/əˈsaɪləm/Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounA place of safety or refuge.
nounThe protection, physical and legal, afforded by such a place (as, for example, for political refugees).
Sentence Examples
The embassy denied political asylum to foreign refugees.
Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.
Synonyms & Antonyms
Synonyms:
Antonyms:
None
CEFR Practice Quiz
The refugee sought ____ in a neutral country to escape persecution.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The political refugee requested ____ to protect himself from his regime.
Word Origin & History
From Latin asylum, from Ancient Greek ἄσυλον (ásulon).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"All the busy concerns of daily existence were utterly abhorrent to me. I loathed the sound of others' voices—I hated to be mixed up with their petty routine of ordinary cares; here was an asylum offered to me—here I might lay down all the offices of humanity, and dwell beside that grave whose rest was now my only desire."
— 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XXVIII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 295:
"So lawyers started filing separate asylum requests for the children, arguing that reintegrating in countries they barely knew, after spending their childhood or adolescence in Belgium, would not only be impossible but would expose them to serious risks."
— 2020 August 5, Francesca Spinelli, “Meet David: born in France, raised in Belgium, facing removal to the DRC”, in The Guardian, archived from the original on 05 Jan 2021:
"Of all the queer collections of humans outside of a crazy asylum, it seemed to me this sanitarium was the cup winner. […] When you're well enough off so's you don't have to fret about anything but your heft or your diseases you begin to get queer, I suppose."
— 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter V, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
"It was she who in the last few years had spread abroad the notion that Charles Nagle, in the public interest, should be asylumed."
— 1913, Marie Belloc Lowndes, chapter III, in Studies in Love & in Terror, page 144:
"We have..sheltered its paupers, asylumed its orphans, clothed its nakedness."
— 1887, 6th Annual Session Baptist Congress:
Explore More C1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
The refugee sought ____ in a neutral country to escape persecution.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The political refugee requested ____ to protect himself from his regime.