solitary

noun

1. (countable)One who lives alone, or in solitude; an anchorite, hermit or recluse.

   “He brooded and intrigued fantastically. He was becoming one of the big-time solitaries. And he wasn't meant to be a solitary. He was meant to be in active life, a social creature.”

   “Tilling my own grave to keep me level Jam another dragon down the hole Digging to the rhythm and the echo of a solitary siren One that pushes me along and leaves me so Desperate and ravenous”

2. (abbreviation, alt-of, ellipsis, uncountable)Ellipsis of solitary confinement.

   “The prisoners who started the riot were moved to solitary.”

3. (uncountable)The state of being solitary; solitude

   “You must wonder why I'm relentless and all strung out/I'm consumed by the chill of solitary”

4. (alt-of, archaic)Archaic form of solitaire (“Rodrigues solitaire”).

adj

1. (not-comparable)Living or being by oneself; alone; having no companion present

   “The solitary, lumbering trolls of Scandinavian mythology would sometimes be turned to stone by exposure to sunlight. Barack Obama is hoping that several measures announced on June 4th will have a similarly paralysing effect on their modern incarnation, the patent troll.”

   “Though we don’t all reach nirvana when we swim, swimming may well be that last refuge from connectivity — and, for some, the only way to find the solitary self.”

2. (not-comparable)Performed, passed, or endured alone.

   “a solitary journey”

   “a solitary life”

3. (not-comparable)Not much visited or frequented; remote from society

   “a solitary residence or place”

4. (not-comparable)Not inhabited or occupied; without signs of inhabitants or occupation; desolate; deserted

   “the solitary desert”

   “How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people!”

   “Eldridge closed the despatch-case with a snap and, rising briskly, walked down the corridor to his solitary table in the dining-car.”

5. (not-comparable)Gloomy; dismal, because of not being inhabited.
6. (not-comparable)Single; individual; sole.

   “a solitary example”

   “On once more we swung, bumping uneasily along in the antique narrow-gauge coach, with gloomy woods and gathering night outside, shouts and songs (and quacks) inside—this was not at all the sort of train ordained by the logical strategists in Paris—then grinding to a stop at a mysterious halt which was no more than a nameboard in the pinewoods, without even a footpath leading to it, but nevertheless with a solitary passenger stolidly waiting.”

   “That makes it almost half a season with just a solitary win, and Mark Hughes' side will reflect on a costly capitulation at the end of the first half after fine goals from Stuart Armstrong and Cedric Soares had seemingly put them in control.”

7. (not-comparable)Not associated with others of the same kind.