hos ‧ tage /ˈhɒstɪdʒ $ ˈhɑː-/ BrE AmE noun [countable]
[ Date: 1200-1300 ; Language: Old French ; Origin: hoste ; ⇨ ↑ host 1 ]
1 . someone who is kept as a prisoner by an enemy so that the other side will do what the enemy demands ⇨ kidnap :
The group are holding two tourists hostage (=keeping them as hostages) .
a family taken hostage at gunpoint
2 . be (a) hostage to something to be influenced and controlled by something, so that you are not free to do what you want:
Our country must not be held hostage to our past.
3 . a hostage to fortune something that you have promised to do that may cause you problems in the future
• • •
THESAURUS
▪ prisoner someone who is kept in a prison as a punishment for a crime, or while they are waiting for their ↑ trial :
Prisoners may be locked in their cells for twenty-two hours a day.
|
a prisoner serving a life sentence for murder
▪ convict especially written someone who has been found guilty of a crime and sent to a prison. Convict is used especially about someone who is sent to prison for a long time. It is more commonly used in historical descriptions, or in the phrase an escaped convict :
The convicts were sent from England to Australia.
|
Police were hunting for an escaped convict.
|
Low-risk convicts help to fight forest fires and clean up public lands.
▪ inmate someone who is kept in a prison or a mental hospital:
Some inmates are allowed to have special privileges.
|
He was described by a fellow inmate as a quiet man.
▪ captive especially literary someone who is kept somewhere and not allowed to go free, especially in a war or fighting. Captive is a rather formal word which is used especially in literature:
Their objective was to disarm the enemy and release the captives.
|
She was held captive (=kept as a prisoner) in the jungle for over three years.
▪ prisoner of war a soldier, member of the navy etc who is caught by the enemy during a war and kept in the enemy’s country:
My grandad was a prisoner of war in Germany.
|
They agreed to release two Iranian prisoners of war.
▪ hostage someone who is kept somewhere as a prisoner, in order to force people to agree to do something, for example in order to get money or to achive a political aim:
Diplomats are continuing their efforts to secure the release of the hostages.
|
The US hostages were held in Tehran for over a year.
▪ detainee/internee someone who is kept in a prison, usually because of their political views and often without a trial:
In some cases, political detainees have been beaten or mistreated.
|
23,531 people passed through the camps between 1944 and 1962, including 14,647 political internees.
|
the detainees at Guantanamo Bay