PENITENTIARY • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Penitentiary

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/pˌɛnɪtˈɛntʃəri/ Listen

noun

Penitentiary n. (pl. penitentiaries)

1.

One who prescribes the rules and measures of penance. (Obs.)

2.

One who does penance. (Obs.)

3.

A small building in a monastery where penitents confessed.

4.

That part of a church to which penitents were admitted.

5.

(R. C. Ch.)

(a)

An office of the papal court which examines cases of conscience, confession, absolution from vows, etc., and delivers decisions, dispensations, etc. Its chief is a cardinal, called the Grand Penitentiary, appointed by the pope.

(b)

An officer in some dioceses since A. D. 1215, vested with power from the bishop to absolve in cases reserved to him.

6.

A house of correction, in which offenders are confined for punishment, discipline, and reformation, and in which they are generally compelled to labor; a prison; a jail. Colloquially often shortened to pen.

adjective

Penitentiary adj.

1.

Relating to penance, or to the rules and measures of penance. "A penitentiary tax."

2.

Expressive of penitence; as, a penitentiary letter.

3.

Used for punishment, discipline, and reformation. "Penitentiary houses."

See images of 'Penitentiary'

Etymology of 'Penitentiary'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Penitentiary" Quotes from Famous Books

... o' Cromwell on whoever let the black snakes loose. But they'd been cooped up, and they knew they were not keepin' the dinies down, and they got worried over the work they were neglectin'. So they took turns diggin', like prisoners in a penitentiary, and presently they broke out and like the faithful creatures they are they set anxious to work on their backlog of diny-catchin'. Which they're doin'. They've ruined us entirely, but they ...

— Attention Saint Patrick • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... disgraced, and adorned so many modes of worship. The name he went by was not supposed by his friend to be that of his family, but all inquiries were vain. His reasons for concealing his original were penitentiary; he deserved no other name than that of the impostor, he said. That portion of the Universal History which was written by him does not seem to me to be composed with peculiar spirit, but all traces of the wit and the wanderer were probably worn out before he undertook ...

— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi

... would crawl out of bed, come downtown cussing, and bail away in sleepy tones. The next morning the freshie would go up before Squire Jennings, who would ask him in awful accents if he realized that the state penitentiary was only four hours away by fast train, and that many a man was boarding there who would blush to be seen in the company of a man who had stolen a nine-foot sign and carried it down Main Street, interfering with pedestrians, when there was a ...

— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch

... half as many arrests, and the streets on which it was unsafe for a lady to go alone, have become orderly. Local option has established temperance in Georgia. Out of 137 counties 115 are controlled by prohibition. In Iowa under prohibition, the Fort Madison Penitentiary is for the first time short of the supply of convicts sufficient to fulfil the usual contracts. England now has a national prohibition party, and Mr. ...

— Buchanan's Journal of Man, August 1887 - Volume 1, Number 7 • Various

... she's a peach, and more than that, she's a brick. She's the divide-her-last-penny kind—Georgia McCormick is. And I want you to know that if ever any one had the joy of living stunt down pat, she's it. It's an honest fact that if she was put in the penitentiary and you went to see her after she'd been there awhile, she'd tell you so many funny and interesting things about the pen. that you'd feel sore to think you weren't in yourself. And smart? And a hustler? Well, her paper's done some fool things, but it's had sense to hold ...

— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell

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