- An example of a colony was Massachusetts under British rule during the 17th and 18th centuries.
- An example of a colony is a group of ants.
The definition of a colony is a group of people who create a settlement in a distant land but remain under the governmental control of their native country or a group of similar animals that live together.
colony
pl. -·nies
- a group of people who settle in a distant land but remain under the political jurisdiction of their native land
- the region thus settled
- a territory distant from the state having jurisdiction or control over it
- the thirteen British colonies in North America that won their independence in the Revolutionary War and became the U.S.: they were Va., N.Y., Mass., Conn., R.I., N.H., Md., N.J., N.C., S.C., Pa., Del., and Ga.
- a community of people of the same nationality or pursuits concentrated in a particular district or place: the Hungarian colony of Cleveland, an artists' colony
- such a district or place
- Bacteriology a group of cells that are derived from a single initial cell, growing separately on a solid culture medium
- Biol. a group of similar plants or animals living or growing together
- Zool. a compound organism consisting of several to many incompletely separated individuals, as in corals and hydroids
Origin of colony
Middle English colonie ; from Classical Latin colonia ; from colonus, farmer ; from colere, to cultivate: see cultcolony
noun
pl. col·o·nies- a. A group of emigrants or their descendants who settle in a distant territory but remain subject to or closely associated with the parent country.b. A territory thus settled.
- A region politically controlled by a distant country; a dependency.
- a. A group of people with the same interests or ethnic origin concentrated in a particular area: the American colony in Paris.b. The area occupied by such a group.
- Colonies The British colonies that became the original 13 states of the United States.
- A group of people who have been institutionalized in a relatively remote area: an island penal colony.
- A group of the same kind of animals, plants, or one-celled organisms living or growing together.
- A visible growth of microorganisms, usually in a solid or semisolid nutrient medium.
Origin of colony
Middle English colonie, from Latin col&omacron;nia, from col&omacron;nus, settler, from colere, to cultivate; see kwel-1 in Indo-European roots.colony
Noun
(plural colonies)
- A settlement of emigrants who move to a new place, but remain culturally tied to their original place of origin
- Region or governmental unit created by another country and generally ruled by another country.
- A group of people with the same interests or ethnic origin concentrated in a particular geographic area
- A group of organisms of same or different species living together in close association.
- A collective noun for rabbits.
Origin
From Latin colōnia (“colony”), from colōnus (“farmer; colonist”), from colō (“till, cultivate, worship”), from earlier *quelō, from Proto-Indo-European *kʷel- (“to move; to turn (around)”).
