Word.ws English Dictionary

cloister

UK/ˈklɔɪstə//ˈklɔɪstɚ/

cloister noun: such an arcade in a monastery;.

Noun

cloister (plural cloisters)

  1. such an arcade in a monastery;
  2. such an arcade fitted with representations of the stages of Christ's Passion.
  3. A place, especially a monastery or convent, devoted to religious seclusion.
  4. (figuratively) The monastic life.

Verb

cloister (third-person singular simple present cloisters, present participle cloistering, simple past and past participle cloistered)

  1. (intransitive) To become a Roman Catholic religious.
    Synonyms:
    enter religion
  2. (transitive) To confine in a cloister, voluntarily or not.
  3. (intransitive) To deliberately withdraw from worldly things.
  4. (transitive) To provide with a cloister or cloisters.
    • The architect cloistered the college just like the monastery which founded it.
  5. (transitive) To protect or isolate.
    • Unique condo cloistered on top of hill.1983 April 9, “Beacon Hill: Mt Vernon St. (classified advertisement)”, in Gay Community News, page 14

cloister meaning in Tamil, Bengali, Malayalam and Persian

cloister in Tamil

கவானோடை

cloister in Bengali

মঠ, গির্জার আবৃত্ত ঘেরা উঠান

cloister in Malayalam

ഏകാന്തജീവിതം, കന്യാസ്ത്രീമഠം

cloister in Persian

place devoted to religious seclusion
صومعه some'e, مانستان mānestān
monastic life
صومعگی some'egi

Examples of cloister in a sentence

  • Then he ventures down the slypes which lead between pavilions into the cloister yards.
  • In choir and cloister, gathering up dropped Syllables, mismumbled words dislodged From the liturgy by sinful clerics.
  • Magdeburg Cathedral, cloisters), true sgraffito developed in Italy and spread from there.

All 14 example sentences with cloister

Synonyms of cloister

  • enter religion

Forms of cloister

Noun
pluralcloisters
alternative form (obsolete)cloistre
Verb
third-person singular presentcloisters
present participlecloistering
past participlecloistered
pastcloistered

Plural of cloister: cloisters

Origin of cloister

Recorded since about 1300 as Middle English cloistre, borrowed from Old French cloistre, clostre, or via Old English clauster, both from Medieval Latin claustrum (“portion of monastery closed off to laity”), from Latin claustrum (“place shut in, bar, bolt, enclosure”), a derivation of the past participle of claudere (“to close”). Doublet of claustrum.

Words formed from cloister

Phrases with cloister

Words that rhyme with cloister

Questions about cloister

What does cloister mean?
Cloister means such an arcade in a monastery;.
What is cloister in Tamil?
Cloister in Tamil is கவானோடை. See Cloister meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is cloister?
Cloister can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce cloister?
Cloister is pronounced /ˈklɔɪstə/ (UK).
What is the plural of cloister?
The plural of cloister is cloisters.

Words near cloister in the dictionary

  1. cloisonnist
  2. cloisonnists
  3. cloisonné
  4. cloisonnés
  5. cloisons
  6. cloister
  7. cloister vault
  8. cloister vaults
  9. cloisteral
  10. cloistered
  11. cloisterer

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cloister (page history and authors); cloister (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cloister (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cloister (Malayalam Wiktionary) (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-cloister.ogg, en-au-cloister.ogg.

Cite this entry: “cloister.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cloister. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.