redoubt

¹

[ ri-dout ]

noun

1. Fortification.
   1. an isolated work forming a complete enclosure of any form, used to defend a prominent point.
   2. an independent earthwork built within a permanent fortification to reinforce it.
2. any safe and secure place or situation; refuge; stronghold:

   Lebanon has represented one of the last redoubts of Christianity in the Middle East.

Redoubt

²

[ ri-dout, ree-dout ]

noun

1. Mount, an active volcano in S Alaska, on the Alaska Peninsula: highest peak in the Aleutian Range. 10,197 feet (3,108 meters).

redoubt

/ rɪˈdaʊt /

noun

1. an outwork or detached fieldwork defending a pass, hilltop, etc
2. a temporary defence work built inside a fortification as a last defensive position

Word History and Origins

Origin of redoubt¹

First recorded in 1600–10; from French redoute, from Italian ridotto, from Late Latin reductus “a refuge,” noun use of past participle of Latin redūcere “to lead back”; reduce

Word History and Origins

Origin of redoubt¹

C17: via French from obsolete Italian ridotta , from Medieval Latin reductus shelter, from Latin redūcere to withdraw, from re- + dūcere to lead

Example Sentences

When the smoke, clouds and confusion cleared ever so briefly this past week, we caught him in transit from his undisclosed mountain redoubt to California, where he was rescuing an elderly parent.

From Ozy

He and the troops then retreated across New Jersey to a winter redoubt.

From The Daily Beast

The Fuhrer may have fallen but his ideology persists in this redoubt of Nazism, untroubled by a sympathetic Argentine regime.

From The Daily Beast

Griffith was elected to a North Alabama district in 2008 that had long been a Democratic redoubt in the midst of a deep red sea.

From The Daily Beast

Or does it want to remain a redoubt for a shrinking minority of older whites?

From The Daily Beast

Horsemeat, I realized at the Rue Poncelet counter, is a last redoubt against the onslaught of global acculturation.

From The Daily Beast

My station was on the right of the line, where the breastwork, ending in a redoubt, was steep and high.

From Project Gutenberg

They are faced by a horrid redoubt held by machine guns, and they are to rush it with the bayonet.

From Project Gutenberg

The last thing—against the skyline—a little column of French soldiers of the line charging back upwards towards the lost redoubt.

From Project Gutenberg

"We must take the redoubt," he said, "or——" and he passed his hand in a suggestive way across his throat.

From Project Gutenberg

At Moskowa his cuirassiers, sabre in hand, drove the Russians out of the great redoubt, but Grouchy himself was seriously wounded.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• barrier
• citadel
• garrison
• rampart