Brewer's: Sanctum Sanctorum

A private room into which no one uninvited enters. The reference is to the Holy of Holies in the Jewish Temple, a small chamber into which none but the high priest might enter, and that only on the Great Day of Atonement. A man's private house is his sanctuary; his own special private room in that house is the sanctuary of the sanctuary, or the sanctum sanctorum.

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
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