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Glite Dictionary
hareem

hareem

1 9.9
A private part of a Muslim household where women live apart from men
  • noun
  • /hɑːˈriːm/
  • NSFW
translation icon : harén
  • The innermost heart of a Bedouin's tent is the mharam where the hareem spend their daily activities.

Examples

  • No, not Hareem.

    Malcolm X (1992)

  • I shall produce an authoritative guide to the zinc bars and... I want to say hareems.

    The English Patient (1996)

  • Are we in the right country for hareems?

    The English Patient (1996)

  • -Hareem?

    Malcolm X (1992)

  • My understanding is that a lot of chick-flicks are very good films in their own right, and only miss being recognized as such because they're over there in the hareem.

    Blog text (9)

  • A hareem was very pleasant, but he had a certain nostalgic affection for Ekhnonpa, and he'd kept her around.

    Fiction book (2000)

  • The Princess Beloved, favorite of Belshazzar, in a room of scented cedar, plated with pure gold, in the hareem of My Lord the Prince.

    Intolerance: Love's Struggle Throughout the Ages (1916)

  • If the Muslim thug comes to you and tells you to hand over your preteen daughter, or your lovely wife, or your young sister, so he can rape her and 'convert' her to Islam and lock her up in the hareem, will you bow and scrape and say 'yes, yes, effendi'?

    Blog text (21)

  • The hareem is a private space in the household where the women of the family can gather and socialize.

  • Visitors to the palace are not allowed access to the hareem, as it is reserved for the family members only.

Synonyms

harem
vshareem
32 8.2

The part of a Muslim home where wives and other women live apart from men

is more about traditional seclusion from men rather than a neutral space
seraglio
vshareem
  • Archaic
1 9.9

Part of a palace, often in the past, where a ruler's wives and female relatives lived

is the domestic part, not necessarily palatial or empire specific
harim
vshareem
9.9

A private part of a Muslim home where women live and men do not enter

is secluded from men generally rather than only from nonfamily men
serail
vshareem
  • Archaic
9.9

A private part of a Muslim household, traditionally where the man's wives and female relatives live separately

is the living area concept used across times, not only as a historic term

Surface Forms

hareem singular
hareems plural

Etymology

Hareem comes from the Arabic root haram, which means 'forbidden' or 'private', and came into English through Turkish. So a hareem was the private part of a house for wives and female relatives, kept apart from men.