Halls

How to spell halls

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce halls

What does halls mean?

1. nounPlural of hall: large rooms, public buildings, or entrance passages within a building.
2. nounUniversity halls of residence; the buildings where students live during term.

Halls in a sentence

• The museum's marble halls were lined with ancient statues.

• Most first-year students live in halls before renting a flat.

• Portraits of past directors hung along the halls of the old college.

• She moved into halls a week before the term began.

Where does halls come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is the plural of 'hall', which descends from the Old English 'heall', meaning a large roofed space or a great chamber where a lord and his household gathered. That word goes back to a Germanic root tied to the idea of something covered or concealed, the same notion that gives us 'hell' (a covered, hidden place) and 'hull' (a covering or husk). Over the centuries the sense narrowed and spread in several directions: the grand communal room of a manor, the entrance passage of a house, and large public buildings used for meetings or concerts. In British usage 'halls' also became shorthand for university 'halls of residence', the dormitory buildings where students live. The persistent spelling trap is the homophone 'hauls': both sound identical, but 'halls' keeps the 'all' of 'hall' while 'hauls' carries the 'au' of pulling.

How the word is built

• hall (large room or passage, from Old English heall)
• -s (plural)