Other forms: orphanages
An orphanage is the home that raises children who have no parents. Grow up in an orphanage, run an orphanage, close the orphanage.
Most countries have closed theirs, because the evidence that institutions harm young children's development is overwhelming and fostering does better. Most children in orphanages worldwide have a living parent and were placed there through poverty. Note orphan, and the -age ending naming a place or a state.
1nounorphanageA home that raises children without parents.
“After her parents died in the war, she grew up in an orphanage.”
orphanage is an institution.
Orphan plus -age, attested from the 1570s. The -age ending names a place or condition, as in hermitage.
Proto-Indo-European
*h₃erbʰ-
Proto-Indo-European
*h₃órbʰos
Ancient Greek
ὀρφανός — without parents, fatherless
Latin
orphanus
English
orphan
English, today
orphanage
Attested since the 1570s; orphan + age. orphan Late Middle English -, from Latin orphanus, from Ancient Greek ὀρφανός (“without parents, fatherless”), from Proto-Indo-European h₃órbʰos. Cognate with Sanskrit अर्भ, Latin orbus (“orphaned”), xcl որբ (“orphan”), Old High German erbi, arbi (German Erbe (“heir”)), Old English ierfa (“heir”). More at erf.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA