ˈkälənē, -ni sometimes ˈkäln- noun
( -es )
Usage: often attributive
Etymology: Middle English colonie, from Middle French & Latin; Middle French colonie, from Latin colonia, from colonus colonist, farmer, inhabitant (from colere to cultivate, dwell) + -ia -y — more at wheel
1. : a body of people settled in a new territory, foreign and often distant, retaining ties with their motherland or parent state : a settlement in a new country : the territory inhabited by such a body or occupied by such a settlement : the body of descendants of settlers wholly or partially retaining their ideology and organization:
a. : a settlement made in hostile, newly conquered, or unstable country as a means of facilitating established occupation and governed by the parent state
the Roman colonies in Gaul
b. : a settlement in a new territory enjoying a degree of autonomy or semiresponsible government without severing ties with the parent state and without attaining the more free status of a dominion — see crown colony ; compare mandate , protectorate
c. : such a settlement including in its control autochthonous groups in any of a number of statuses
2.
a. : a distinguishable localized population within a species (as a community of termites or bees)
bird colonies on the islands and promontories — P.E.James
b. : a group of two or more kinds of organisms (as species or clones) usually migrant into and developing in a barren area or the interstices of an existent ecological community ; often : an incompletely developed community consisting of two or more kinds of organisms
c. : an assemblage of fossils apparently contained in rocks older than those in which they normally belong
3.
a. : a circumscribed mass of microorganisms developed from a single cell or small cluster of cells, usually growing in or upon a solid or semisolid medium — compare family
b. : the aggregation of zooids of a compound animal
c. : coenobium
4.
a. : a group of persons united by a common characteristic or interest living in a limited section surrounded by others not so united
the American colony in Paris
New York City's Syrian colony
an artist colony
the film colony
also : the section or quarter occupied by such a group
b. : a group of persons institutionalized away from others for some particular kind of care, treatment, correction, or punishment
a leper colony
a colony for epileptics
a penal colony
also : the land or buildings occupied by such a group
c. : a cluster or somewhat discrete group (as of dwellings) usually with common characteristics or functions
a colony of ranch houses
crowded colonies of tiny shingled shacks — F.L.Allen
d. : a group of institution inmates quartered away from main buildings or centers
the children's colony
e. : a nucleus of militants infiltrated into a group or organization
a Communist colony at the power plant