Fort

How to spell fort

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce fort

What does fort mean?

1. nounA fortified building or stronghold occupied by troops for defence.

Fort in a sentence

• The old stone fort guarded the harbour entrance for centuries.

• Soldiers manned the fort through the long winter siege.

Where does fort come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word fort comes from the Latin adjective fortis, which simply meant 'strong'. From that root the Romans formed phrases and later the Italian word forte and the noun for a fortified place, and the sense passed into French as fort, meaning a strengthened defensive position. English took it over in the fifteenth century to name a small fortified building or stronghold garrisoned by soldiers. The same fortis root sits inside a whole family of familiar English words, including 'fortify', 'fortress', 'force', and even 'comfort', which originally meant to strengthen someone in spirit. Because the spelling keeps the bare Latin stem, fort is short and regular, with no silent letters to trip over, though writers must keep it distinct from the longer 'forte' meaning a strong point.

How the word is built

• fort (from Latin fortis: strong)
• (zero suffix, noun)