From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Bastile \Bas*tile"\ Bastille \Bas*tille"\(b[.a]s*t[=e]l" or b[.a]s"t[-e]l; 277), noun [F. bastille fortress, OF. bastir to build, F. b[^a]tir.]
1. (Feud. Fort.) A tower or an elevated work, used for the defense, or in the siege, of a fortified place.
The high bastiles . . . which overtopped the walls. --Holland.
2. ''The Bastille'', formerly a castle or fortress in Paris, used as a prison, especially for political offenders; hence, a rhetorical name for a prison.
From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:
noun
1: a jail (literally, a French jail)
From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:
58 Moby Thesaurus words for "bastille": POW camp, black hole, borstal, borstal institution, bridewell, brig, bucket, caboose, calaboose, can, cell, chokey, concentration camp, condemned cell, confine, constrain, death cell, death house, death row, detention camp, federal prison, forced-labor camp, gaol, guardhouse, hoosegow, house of correction, house of detention, immure, incarcerate, industrial school, intern, internment camp, jail, jailhouse, jug, keep, labor camp, lockup, maximum-security prison, minimum-security prison, oubliette, pen, penal colony, penal institution, penal settlement, penitentiary, prison, prison camp, prisonhouse, quod, reform school, reformatory, sponging house, state prison, stockade, the hole, tollbooth, training school
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