Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
🕵️ To hide away 🐻 To hibernate
to hole up

to hole up

1 7.3
An animal taking shelter in a safe place to sleep through winter
  • phrasal verb
  • /hoʊl ʌp/
translation icon : hibernar
  • Bears typically hole up in caves to hibernate until the spring.

Examples

  • They want to hole up, and Littleton is the perfect place to do it.

    Fiction book (1998)

  • Why don't you guys hole up in town for a little bit?

    Maximum Conviction (2012)

  • Second, I need a place to hole up for a couple days.

    The Drop (2014)

  • We can hole up there.

    The Revenant (2015)

  • Makes me want to find a deep cave and hole up for a while.

    Blog text (5)

  • For now, you can hole up in my place in Cartagena.

    Gemini Man (2019)

  • I hope that all the thru-hikers out there have found a safe place to hole up.

    Blog text (22)

  • We'll hole up in the piney woods until the Kid feels better.

    3 Godfathers (1948)

  • I wonder, do the little lizards hole up, or do they slosh around in it?

    Blog text (15)

  • Scorpions and centipedes frequently hole up in our shoes or clothes.

    Fiction book (1990)

Synonyms

to hibernate
vsto hole up
19 4.6

To spend the winter in deep sleep like bears to save energy

adds the idea of sheltering in a safe place while dormant
to winter
vsto hole up
6 4.2

To stay in a place during the cold season

emphasizes hiding and dormancy rather than merely remaining in place
to overwinter
vsto hole up
  • UK
3 6.6

To stay somewhere during the winter to survive the cold

implies hiding and dormancy in shelter rather than just surviving
to den
vsto hole up
1 4.2

To take shelter in a hidden place, usually by animals

involves being dormant inside that shelter for the cold months

Antonyms

to emerge
249 3.5

To come out from behind or under something and become visible

to roam
189 2.5

Move around without a fixed place, often while looking for something

Surface Forms

hole up infinitive
holed up past
holed up past participle
holing up present participle
holes up third person singular

Morphology

hole + up

The sense 'to stay in a place to hide or take refuge' is partly derivable from 'hole' (a shelter-like opening) combined with the particle 'up' suggesting location/completion, so learners can envisage going into a hole to hide. However, the construction verbalizes a noun and uses a phrasal-verb particle in a somewhat metaphorical, non-literal way (not necessarily literally entering a hole), so the exact verbal meaning is not fully predictable for an average B1 learner.

Etymology

Hole up comes from animals hiding in a hole or den to sleep through the winter. That image of staying inside to stay safe and quiet is why it means 'to take shelter' or 'hibernate'.