bastion

noun bas·tion \ ˈbas-chən \

|Updated on: 30 Jul 2018

Examples: bastion in a Sentence

Editor's Note: Did You Know?

Definition of bastion

1 : a projecting part of a fortification

a bastion at each of the fort's five corners

2 : a fortified area or position

bombing island bastions

3 : stronghold 2

the last bastion of academic standards
—Amer. Scientist

—

bastioned

play \-chənd\ adjective

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Examples of bastion in a Sentence

the rebel army retreated to its bastion in the mountains to regroup

Recent Examples of bastion from the Web

Once a bastion of the labor movement, Wisconsin also witnessed a dramatic decline in union membership, to just 8 percent of the workforce.

— glenn c. altschuler, Philly.com, "'Fall of Wisconsin': Why Dems lose, and keep on losing," 13 July 2018
Speedway Indoor Karting Former IndyCar driver Sarah Fisher’s place is a blazing bastion of Indy 500 history.

— sarah bahr, Indianapolis Star, "Ultimate Indiana bucket list: 50+ things to do in Indianapolis and around the state," 11 July 2018
McConnell tried eating Saturday at the Bristol in the Highlands, a bastion of liberalism in Louisville, and was chased to his car by people chanting at him.

— joseph gerth, The Courier-Journal, "Eat at home, McConnell, until you're ready to listen to all the people," 10 July 2018
Brazil has increasingly become a bastion for underground electronic music.

— michael sundius, Billboard, "Gui Boratto Talks New Album 'Pentagram': Listen to 'The Phoenix' (Exclusive)," 13 June 2018
After lunch, everyone headed to Topper’s favorite Upper East Side college bar, Dorrian’s, a bastion of preppiness from a bygone era, for the after-party.

— alexandra macon, Vogue, "Inside Tabitha Simmons and Topper Mortimer’s Simply Stylish Upper East Side Wedding," 13 June 2018
And Kim, the most progressive candidate, took the most first-place votes in District Nine, which includes the Mission and Bernal Heights, both far-left bastions.

— heather knight, San Francisco Chronicle, "It’s a really big deal that SF elected London Breed as mayor," 13 June 2018
For years, Nicaragua was considered a bastion of calm.

— whitney eulich, The Christian Science Monitor, "Briefing: Why violence has flared in Nicaragua," 7 June 2018
The world of advertising, once a bastion of overconfident men, is undergoing nothing short of a revolution at Cannes Lions this year.

— claire atkinson, NBC News, "Women take over at Cannes Lions," 18 June 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'bastion.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Did You Know?

Bastion is constructed of etymological building blocks that are very similar to those of "bastille" (a word now used as a general term for a prison, but probably best known as the name of the Parisian fortress-turned-prison stormed by an angry mob at the start of the French Revolution). The history of "bastion" can be traced through Middle French to the Old Italian verb bastire, which means "to build." "Bastille" descends from the Old Occitan verb "bastir," which also means "to build." "Bastir" and "bastire" are themselves of Germanic origin and akin to the Old High German word besten, meaning "to patch."

Origin and Etymology of bastion

Middle French, from Old Italian bastione, augmentative of bastia fortress, derivative from dialect form of bastire to build, of Germanic origin; akin to Old High German besten to patch

NEW! Time Traveler

First Known Use: 1562

in the meaning defined at sense 1

See Words from the same year