Meaning & use

ablution

noun·Advanced

The act of washing oneself, especially as part of a religious ritual.

See it in a sentence

Before entering the temple, worshippers perform a simple ablution at the fountain.

He joked about his morning ablutions taking longer than everyone else's breakfast.

A note on using this word

"Ablutions" is almost always used in the plural, and it can be used humorously in British English to mean simply washing up.

Words with a similar meaning

washingcleansing

Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.

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