Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. An underground vault or chamber, especially one beneath a church that is used as a burial place.
- n. Anatomy A small pit, recess, or glandular cavity in the body.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A hidden or secret recess; a subterranean cell or cave, especially one constructed or used for the interment of bodies, as in the catacombs.
- n. A part of an ecclesiastical building, as a cathedral, church, etc., below the chief floor, commonly set apart for monumental purposes, and sometimes used as a chapel or a shrine.
- n. In anatomy, a follicle; a small simple tubular or saccular secretory pit; a small glandular cavity: as, a mucous crypt (a follicular secretory pit in mucous membrane). See follicle. Also crypta.
Wiktionary
- n. An underground vault, especially one beneath a church that is used as a burial place.
- n. anatomy A small pit or cavity in the body
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A vault wholly or partly under ground; especially, a vault under a church, whether used for burial purposes or for a subterranean chapel or oratory.
- n. (Anat.) A simple gland, glandular cavity, or tube; a follicle.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a cellar or vault or underground burial chamber (especially beneath a church)
Etymologies
- From Latin crypta ("vault"), from Ancient Greek κρυπτός (kryptos, "hidden"). (Wiktionary)
- Latin crypta, from Greek kruptē, from feminine of kruptos, hidden, from kruptein, to hide. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The term crypt is sometimes used to signify the lower story of a two-storied building, e.g. the lower chapel of the”
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 4: Clandestinity-Diocesan Chancery
“We actually talked to a man who's been inside that mausoleum, and he said there are what he calls crypt keepers inside who keep the people who don't own property, as he put it, inside, or shouldn't be in there, they keep them out.”
“Perhaps Walt Disney and Madame Tussaud were inspired by places like this, but the Capuchin crypt will not remind you of their worlds, for in spite of all the talk about the great lengths the monks have gone to in order to create lifelike effects, it feels like somewhere that fell into disuse long ago.”
“In the Paroquia don't forget to ask to visit the tomb of the first? or third? president of México whose crypt is in the basement.”
“This building used to be a church, built by Souffelot, and the crypt is where many famous French people are buried.”
skipperjbk8: Like a lemon to the Lime and a Bumble to the Bee
“The dark and mysterious crypt is there, as is the iron grating, which is pointed to as indicating the exact position of the tomb.”
“Caravaggio's bones found in Italian crypt after 400 years”
“There’s a haunted house (ah, but by what?) called the Angel of Mist, and the only horror greater than the thing rotting in its bricked-up crypt is (but of course, senor) the horror of doomed love.”
“They head out to the crypt, which is in the backyard.”
The Huffington Post: James Frey: Ghosts, Goths, and Galas at the Fabulous Beekman Boys Farm
“Found in a crypt was the mummy of the ruler, who was either 35 - or 3500-years-old, depending on how you're counting.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘crypt’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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October Words-11849
During the month of October, post at least 10 new words to this list. Make sure you cite where you read the word (book/author/pg) and quote the context/sentence where you found it. If someone has a...
desalination, Girn, incongruous, irreparably, pneumatic, metastatic, languorous, menagerie, mottled, valise, moot, deferential and 28 more...
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Words That Have Lost All Meaning
Words that, if you stare at them long enough, they cease to look like real words.
awkward, people, eighth, rhythm, abysmal, aisle, theater, queue, jeopardy, labyrinth, proxy, stoic and 8 more...
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No Dearth of Deadly Designations
catafalque, cenotaph, necropolis, sepulcher, sarcophagus, mausoleum, reliquary, ossuary, necrosis, cadaver, cadaverous, pyre and 103 more...
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Vampire Words
Words that make me think of Vampire: The Requiem
torpor, torpid, amaranth, vitae, embrace, ventrue, toreador, masquerade, dominate, nightmare, majesty, dread and 103 more...
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cindywrites's Words
chiaroscuro, mollycoddle, feckless, evocative, provocative, invocation, beckon, allay, becalm, console, lull, soothe and 479 more...
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The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
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Words Covered in Faery Dust (C)
words that evoke magic, mystery, mayhem, magnificence or anything else that glimmers in the grass
cacophony, cad, cajole, calamity, camomile, camphor, candlemas, candy apple, canopy, canticle, caparison, caravan and 304 more...
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Castles and Keeps
Shamelessly ripped off from this site and others (to be named hereinafter). (Fair warning: for my own edification, I may add definitions/comments from the site, but you might want to just go there ...
abutment, adulterine, allure, angle-spur, apse, arbalest, arbalestier, arbalist, arcade, arch, armoury, arrow slit and 410 more...
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Gaw
Words for things both tangible and anthropic. I'm in the process of spinning off hardware into ute, and people into oofy.
cum-twang, naumachia, yngling, juggernaught, bliss ninny, iliac crest, moistened bint, slumlord, spondoolies, classy lady, charnel house, electrodoméstico and 334 more...
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norrell's Words
hush, dove, euphoria, nebulae, bryn mawr, darling, phoenix, nape, cream, butterscotch, cosmos, frost and 190 more...
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wordsmithing part deux
because wordsmith is not a verb.
enmity, incarnate, chignon, nape, solitude, nocturne, decorum, warren, svelte, interstice, serene, charlotte and 488 more...
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the name of the rose
pleasing words I encounter whilst reading umberto eco's novel of the same name.
matins, lauds, prime, terce, sext, nones, vespers, compline, usurper, simoniac, heresiarch, malefactor and 230 more...
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Setting the Scene: Dark and Dreary
Words that lend to the dark and dreary atmosphere of gothic literature.
dark, dreary, shroud, shrouded, veiled, skeleton, skeletal, dead, death, murky, gloomy, lugubrious and 274 more...
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wackyvorlon's list
herein, execrable, extirpate, ameliorate, sawbuck, obstreperous, truculent, festinate, exiguous, exsanguinate, vehement, vex and 135 more...
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ash
ash
abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abide, abject, abjure and 4874 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for crypt.
agustinolvera Eclispe by Stephenie Meyer Page 78
-"I'll stop by your crypt after school." Nov 1, 2010