Meaning & use
inviolate
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Meanings
adjectivecomparableformalliterary
Remaining whole and untouched, not broken, harmed or dishonored by anyone.
Grammar: Usually follows a verb like remain or keep: the law remained inviolate.
Patterns
- remain inviolate
- keep something inviolate
The treaty remained inviolate for fifty years.
The monks kept the silence of the cloister inviolate.
The old forest stayed inviolate because no road reached it.
adjectivebefore a nounformal
Treated as sacred or protected, so that it must not be attacked or ignored.
Grammar: Before a noun it sounds solemn: an inviolate right.
Patterns
- inviolate principle
- inviolate right
Freedom of speech was seen as an inviolate right.
She held the promise to be inviolate.
The family treated the sacred grove as inviolate ground.
Common combinations
- remain inviolate
- The border remained inviolate despite the pressure.
- keep inviolate
- He tried to keep his privacy inviolate.
- inviolate right
- Citizens regarded the vote as an inviolate right.
- inviolate space
- The garden was her inviolate space.
- inviolate vow
- Their vow of secrecy stayed inviolate.
Synonyms and how they differ
- intact
- Intact is an everyday word for something not damaged, while inviolate adds the sense of respected or protected from attack.
- sacrosanct
- Sacrosanct means too sacred to criticize or change, whereas inviolate describes what has in fact stayed unbroken.
- unspoiled
- Unspoiled is gentler and fits scenery, but inviolate suggests a boundary no one has crossed.
Opposites
Word family
- inviolable adjective
- that must never be violated or cannot be broken
- inviolability noun
- the quality of being safe from violation
- violate verb
- to break a rule or disturb something protected
- violation noun
- an act of breaking a rule or right
Commonly confused: inviolate or inviolable?
inviolate vs inviolable
Inviolable describes something that must not or cannot be violated, while inviolate describes something that has not been violated.
Practice
Despite many attempts to break it, the vow remained ___ to the end.
Choose one answer.
Inviolate means not broken or violated. Violent shares a root sound but describes force, not an unbroken promise.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “inviolate”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.