Noun

(en noun)

An association for the advancement of learning, particularly in the fields of science or literature.

* {{quote-news, year=1994, date=June 3, author=Michael Miner, title=Will This Man Save Inland Architect?/A Simple Process, work=Chicago Reader citation

, passage=A panel of architects who might loosely be described as the local athenaeum of their profession are awaiting, anxiously, the next edition of the bimonthly journal that bears their names. }}

A building for storing books or newspapers; a library, reading room etc.

* {{quote-book, year=1921, author=Christopher Morley, title=Plum Pudding, chapter=, edition= citation

, passage=And this, too, may have been not unconnected with the gracious influence of the other sex as exhibited in a neighbouring athenaeum ; and was accompanied by a gruesome spate of florid lyrics: some (happily) secret, and some exposed with needless hardihood in a college magazine. }}