Word.ws English Dictionary

potter's field

potter's field noun: a public place where strangers, paupers, and criminals are buried.

Noun

potter's field (plural potter's fields)

  1. (idiomatic) A public place where strangers, paupers, and criminals are buried.
    • The despised pauper, most likely a foreigner, when his spirit has gone to its final resting-place, is probably carried to the Potter's Field.1862, David W. Mitchell, Ten Years in the United States, Elder Smith, page 157
    • There was a Potter's Field, a cemetery for the poor and friendless, far out in the country.1917. Anna Alice Chapin, Greenwich Village (Mead Dodd, p. 10)

Examples of potter's field in a sentence

  • Hart's Island has been used for the past 50 years as a potter's field for the burial of the paupers.1925. Hastings Hornell Hart, Two Reports on the Reorganization and Reconstruction of the New York Prison System (Prison Association of New...
  • Humboldt had been buried not in potter's field but far out in Deathsille, New Jersey, one of those vast, necropolitan developments …1976 September, Saul Bellow, Humboldt’s Gift, New York, N.Y.: Avon Books, →ISBN, page 467:

Synonyms of potter's field

Forms of potter's field

pluralpotter's fields
alternative formpottersfield

Origin of potter's field

This phrase derives from the reference to the potter's field in the New Testament, Matthew 27:7. After Judas Iscariot committed suicide and left the 30 pieces of silver from betraying Jesus, the chief priest use the money to purchase a potter's field to bury gentiles.

Questions about potter's field

What does potter's field mean?
Potter's field means a public place where strangers, paupers, and criminals are buried.
How do you use potter's field in a sentence?
Hart's Island has been used for the past 50 years as a potter's field for the burial of the paupers.
What part of speech is potter's field?
Potter's field is a noun.
What is the plural of potter's field?
The plural of potter's field is potter's fields.

Words near potter's field in the dictionary

  1. potter wasp
  2. potter wasps
  3. potter's asthma
  4. potter's clay
  5. potter's clays
  6. potter's field
  7. potter's fields
  8. Potter's Green
  9. potter's ore
  10. potter's rot
  11. potter's wheel

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: potter's field (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-au-potter's field.ogg.

Cite this entry: “potter's field.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/potter%27s_field. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.