HOSTAGE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does hostage mean? 

• HOSTAGE (noun)
  The noun HOSTAGE has 1 sense:

1. a prisoner who is held by one party to insure that another party will meet specified terms

  Familiarity information: HOSTAGE used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• HOSTAGE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A prisoner who is held by one party to insure that another party will meet specified terms

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

hostage; surety

Hypernyms ("hostage" is a kind of...):

captive; prisoner (a person who is confined; especially a prisoner of war)

 Context examples 

And if you want to know about number four, and that boy, why, shiver my timbers, isn't he a hostage?

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Meantime, I send you Fidelio as a hostage.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

By Saint Paul! it was not our wont in those days to pay gold for the opening of passes, nor would we hold a king as hostage lest his people come to thrusts with us.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

As for hostage, he continued, that's his last talk, I guess, with them he loves so dear.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

“I hear that the prince hath the King of Navarre as hostage,” said Alleyne, “and it is said that he hath sworn to put him to death if there be any attack upon us.”

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

But there is, and not so long till then; and we'll see who'll be glad to have a hostage when it comes to that.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

With him rode the King of Majorca, the hostage King of Navarre, and the fierce Don Pedro of Spain, whose pale blue eyes gleamed with a sinister light as they rested once more upon the distant peaks of the land which had disowned him.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Are we a-going to waste a hostage?

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

He does but ask some delay and certain conditions and hostages—

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)