Word.ws English Dictionary

ante-camera

ante-camera noun: an antechamber, specifically one where visitors wait before being given audience with an influential person such as a pope or monarch.

Noun

ante-camera (plural ante-cameras)

  1. An antechamber, specifically one where visitors wait before being given audience with an influential person such as a pope or monarch.
    • As it hapned to that wiſe Philoſopher who being clad in a meane but honeſt habit, preſſed amongſt the rest to the Kings Ante-camera, or with-drawing Chamber, where hee vſed to giue Audience, hauing very neceſſary occaſion to ſpeake vnto him.1632, [Juan de Santa María], translated by I. M. [i.e., James Mabbe], “Of the Repartment and Diuision Which Is to Be Vsed in the Conferring of Offices; […]”, in Policie Vnueiled: Wherein May Be...
    • Forget I never can, to my last hour, / Sev’n years ago, when ordered to Vienna, to obtain / Remounts for our brave army, / How, from one Ante-Camera, away / To another I was shov’d; suffer’d to stand / Whole hours under the arch, / As though I came to beg my pension; / At last a Capuchin was sent...1805, [Friedrich] Schiller, anonymous translator, The Piccolomini’s: A Drama, […], London: Albion Press: […] J. Cundee, […] sold by C. Chapple, […], →OCLC, act I, scene ii, page 10

Forms of ante-camera

pluralante-cameras
alternative formanti-camera

Origin of ante-camera

From Middle French anticamera and its etymon Italian anticamera, with substitution of ante-, originally after Spanish antecámara, itself after Italian.

Questions about ante-camera

What does ante-camera mean?
Ante-camera means an antechamber, specifically one where visitors wait before being given audience with an influential person such as a pope or monarch.
What part of speech is ante-camera?
Ante-camera is a noun.
What is the plural of ante-camera?
The plural of ante-camera is ante-cameras.

Words near ante-camera in the dictionary

  1. ante over
  2. ante up
  3. ante-
  4. ante-cabinet
  5. ante-cabinets
  6. ante-camera
  7. ante-historic
  8. ante-mortem
  9. ante-Mosaic
  10. ante-Nicene
  11. ante-port

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ante-camera (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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