Adytum

Quick meaning: Adytum is a noun meaning (Ancient Greece, religion) The innermost sanctuary or shrine in a temple, from where oracles were given.

Meaning

(Ancient Greece, religion) The innermost sanctuary or shrine in a temple, from where oracles were given.

More Meanings

1. (by extension) A private chamber; a sanctum.

Example Sentences

The adytums or inner circles of Abury and Stonehenge bear such an analogy to the holy of holies in Solomon's temple, as to induce the belief that they were formed subsequently to the temple of Jerusalem, with which the Tyrian workmen were quite familiar.

They [the Hermetists] met for instruction in a sacred place, an adytum or shrine, which was apparently set apart solely for this purpose, and where they believed they could create conditions suitable for the reception of the inspiration of the Divine Mind by the instructor and for the handing of it on to the pupils— […]

Although it was the custom for the priestesses to affect a holy fury, a species of temporary insanity, in the delivering of their oracles, yet it was also the custom to write them on the leaves of trees, and to deposit them at the entrances of their caves, or the adyta of their temples; and it was the object of the devotee to secure them before they were dispersed by the winds; […]

At the diſtance of about forty ſtadia from this temple of Æſculapius, there is an incloſure; and in it there is an adytum ſacred to Iſis. This is the moſt holy of every thing which the Greeks conſecrate to this goddeſs. For the Tithoreans neither think it proper to take up their reſidence there, nor to ſuffer any to enter the adytum, except ſuch as the goddeſs Iſis informs them by a dream ſhe thinks proper to admit.

Word Forms

• adytums
• adyta

Synonyms for adytum

Depending on context, synonyms include adyt, adyton.

Related Words

Related dictionary entries include adyt, oracle, adoratory, pylon, temple, altar.

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