shrine

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a sacred place dedicated to a deity, saint, ancestor, relic, or other revered figure

   Pilgrims knelt before the small roadside shrine.

2. 2
   noun

   a container or structure in which a sacred relic or image is kept

   The saint's bones were preserved in a silver shrine behind the altar.

3. 3
   noun

   a place treated with great respect because of its association with an admired person or event

   The writer's childhood home has become a shrine for devoted readers.

4. 4
   verb

   to enclose or honor something in a shrine; rare

   The community shrined the relic in a carved wooden case.

From Middle English shryne and Old English scrin, "reliquary," borrowed from Latin scrinium, "case or chest for books or papers." As such chests came to hold sacred remains, the word broadened from the container to the holy place around it and later to any site of intense admiration.

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