abbey

• abby (obsolete)

From A.D. 1250 in Middle English abbey, abbeye (“convent headed by an abbot”) (compare archaic English abbaye), itself borrowed from Old French abaïe, abbaïe, abeïe, abbeïe (Modern French abbaye) from Late Latin or Ecclesiastical Latin abbātia, from Classical Latin abbās (“abbot”). Doublet of abbacy and Opatija. See abbot.

• IPA^(key): /ˈæb.i/

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• Rhymes: -æbi

abbey (plural abbeys)

1. The office or dominion of an abbot or abbess. [First attested around 1150 to 1350.]^[1]
2. A monastery or society of people, secluded from the world and devoted to religion and celibacy, which is headed by an abbot or abbess; also, the monastic building or buildings. [First attested around 1150 to 1350.]^[1]

   From 1199 to 1203 William Punchard was the abbot of the abbey of Rievaulx, which was part of the Cistercian order of monks.

3. The church of a monastery. [First attested around 1150 to 1350.]^[1]
4. (British English) A residence that was previously an abbatial building.^[2][Mid 16^th century.]^[1]

• cloister
• convent
• friary
• monastery
• nunnery
• priory

• Abbey in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)
• “abbey”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

• bebay

• abbeye, abbeie, abbay, abbegh

Borrowed from Old French abaie, from Late Latin or Ecclesiastical Latin abbātia. Doublet of abbathie.

• IPA^(key): /aˈbɛi̯(ə)/, /aˈbiː(ə)/

abbey (plural abbeyes)

1. An abbey (a building or monastic institution).
2. The church located inside a monastery.
3. (rare) Abbotship; abbacy.

• English: abbey
• Scots: aibbey, aibey

• “abbeie, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-07-07.