The AI-powered English dictionary
plural bastions
(architecture) A projecting part of a rampart or other fortification. quotations examples
[…] Fort Camosun had swelled herself from being a little Hudson's Bay Fort, inside a stockade with bastions at the corners, into being the little town of Victoria, and the capital of British Columbia.
1942, Emily Carr, “Beginnings”, in The Book of Small
A well-fortified position; a stronghold or citadel. examples
(figuratively) A person, group, or thing, that strongly defends some principle. examples
Any large prominence; something that resembles a bastion in size and form. quotations examples
[…] yonder cloudThat rises upward always higher,And onward drags a labouring breast,And topples round the dreary west,A looming bastion fringed with fire.
1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], canto XV, page 24
It spread slowly up from the sea-rim, a welling upwards of pure white light, ghosting the beach with silver and drawing the grey bastions of sandstone out of formless space.
1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, page 32
third-person singular simple present bastions, present participle bastioning, simple past and past participle bastioned
(transitive) To furnish with a bastion. examples