hostage
n. countablen. a person who is caught and held by someone else, usually during a crime or war. The person holding them often demands money or a change in a law to let them go.
n. a person seized or held as security for the fulfilment of a condition. Often used in political, criminal, or military contexts to describe individuals detained against their will to force a specific outcome.
The bank robbers took a hostage during the escape.
The government refused to negotiate with the group holding the journalist hostage in the desert.
Diplomatic efforts stalled as both nations accused the other of using civilian detainees as a political hostage to gain leverage in the trade negotiations.
From Middle English hostage, ostage, from Old French hostage, ostage. This, in turn, is either from Old French hoste (“host”) + -age (in which case the sense development is from taking someone into "lodging" to taking them into "captivity", to applying the term to a captive), or is from Vulgar Latin obsidāticum (“condition of being held captive”), from Latin obses (“hostage, captive”), with the initial h- added under the influence of hoste or another word. Displaced native Old English ġīsl.
Commonly used in the phrase 'take someone hostage' or 'hold someone hostage'.
They held him as a hostage for money.They held him hostage for money.While 'a hostage' is a noun, the common idiomatic expression 'hold someone hostage' functions as a fixed phrase and usually omits the article.