conventicle
Syllables: con·ven·ti·cleUK/kənˈvɛntɪk(ə)l/US/kənˈvɛn(t)ək(ə)l/
conventicle noun: a secret, unauthorized or illegal religious meeting.
Noun
conventicle (plural conventicles)
- A secret, unauthorized or illegal religious meeting.
- [I]f when Luther firſt began to teach new doctrine, the catholiks at that time had not vouchſafed to giue him the hering, but had auoided his prechings & preuy couenticles, ther had not bin now in the worlde, either Lutheran, Swinglian, Calueniſt, Puritan, Anabaptiſt, Trinetarie, Family of loue...1581, D. Fulke [i.e., William Fulke], A Briefe Confutation, of a Popish Discourse: […], London: […] [Thomas Dawson] for George Byshop, →OCLC, folio 12, recto and verso
- If publique Aſſemblies of Divines cannot agree upon a right vvay, private Conventicles of illeterate men, vvill ſoon finde a vvrong. Bivious demurres breed devious reſolutions. Paſſengers to heaven are in haſte, and vvill vvalk one vvay or other.1647, Theodore de la Guard [pseudonym; Nathaniel Ward], The Simple Cobler of Aggawam in America. […], London: […] J[ohn] D[ever] & R[obert] I[bbitson] for Stephen Bowtell, […], →OCLC, page 37
- The place where such a meeting is held.
- A Quaker meetinghouse.
Verb
conventicle (third-person singular simple present conventicles, present participle conventicling, simple past and past participle conventicled)
- To hold a secret, unauthorized or illegal religious meeting.
Forms of conventicle
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | conventicles |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | conventicles |
| present participle | conventicling |
| past participle | conventicled |
| past | conventicled |
Origin of conventicle
From Late Middle English conventicle, conventicule (“a gathering, meeting (especially a secret or unlawful one); (derogatory) a church”), from Latin conventiculum (“assembly; meeting (or the place involved); association”), from conventus (“assembled, convened”) + -culum (suffix forming noun diminutives), perfect passive participle of conveniō (“to assemble, convene, meet together”), from con- (“together, with”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱóm (“along, at, next to, with”)) + veniō (“to approach, come”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gʷem- (“to step”) + *-yéti (suffix forming intransitive, imperfective verbs)).
Words formed from conventicle
Questions about conventicle
- What does conventicle mean?
- Conventicle means a secret, unauthorized or illegal religious meeting.
- What part of speech is conventicle?
- Conventicle can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce conventicle?
- Conventicle is pronounced /kənˈvɛntɪk(ə)l/ (UK).
- What is the plural of conventicle?
- The plural of conventicle is conventicles.
Words near conventicle in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: conventicle (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:
Cite this entry: “conventicle.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/conventicle. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.