cellar

[sel-er] /ˈsɛl ər/
noun
1.
a room, or set of rooms, for the storage of food, fuel, etc., wholly or partly underground and usually beneath a building.
2.
an underground room or story.
3.
wine cellar.
4.
Sports. the lowest position in a group ranked in order of games won:
The team was in the cellar for most of the season.
verb (used with object)
5.
to place or store in a cellar.
Origin
1175-1225; Middle English celer < Anglo-French < Latin cellārium storeroom, equivalent to cell(a) cell1 + -ārium -ary; later respelling to reflect Latin form; see -er2, -ar2
Related forms
cellarless, adjective
Examples from the web for cellar
  • IF there's anything more intimidating than shopping for wine, it's shopping for a wine cellar.
  • One evening the family is at supper, and one of the children is sent down cellar to draw a pitcher of beer from the cask.
  • You'd have trouble seeing a picture in a coal cellar.
  • The hosts are expected to offer their unexpected guests a feast from all the food in the cellar and pantry.
  • Order from celebrated menus and an extensive wine cellar.
  • For example, imagine you and your neighbors are hiding in a cellar from marauding enemy soldiers.
  • The geek's kitchen counter is covered with seed trays, the cellar full of tubers, the refrigerator packed with bulbs.
  • The bottles in the cellar still tasted buttery and delicious on the whole, but a few were beginning to turn as well.
  • His leg made it difficult to carry boxes of cranberries down to the cellar where they were graded and preserved.
  • Elser attended the festivities, took note of the cellar's layout, and was surprised to realize that security was lax.
British Dictionary definitions for cellar

cellar

/ˈsɛlə/
noun
1.
an underground room, rooms, or storey of a building, usually used for storage Compare basement
2.
a place where wine is stored
3.
a stock of bottled wines
verb
4.
(transitive) to store in a cellar
Word Origin
C13: from Anglo-French, from Latin cellārium food store, from cellacella
Word Origin and History for cellar
n.

early 13c., "store room," from Anglo-French celer, Old French celier "cellar, underground passage" (12c., Modern French cellier), from Latin cellarium "pantry, storeroom," literally "group of cells;" which is either directly from cella (see cell), or from noun use of neuter of adjective cellarius "pertaining to a storeroom," from cella. The sense in late Middle English gradually shifted to "underground room." Cellar door attested by 1640s.

cellar in the Bible

a subterranean vault (1 Chr. 27:28), a storehouse. The word is also used to denote the treasury of the temple (1 Kings 7:51) and of the king (14:26). The Hebrew word is rendered "garner" in Joel 1:17, and "armoury" in Jer. 50:25.