cottage

Meaning

Noun

1. A small house.
2. A seasonal home of any size or stature, a recreational home or a home in a remote location.
3. (slang) A public lavatory.
4. A meeting place for homosexual men.

Verb

1. To stay at a seasonal home, to go cottaging.
2. To have homosexual sex in a public lavatory; to practice cottaging.

Synonyms

hut

🛖

cabin

bungalow

shack

hovel

shed

lodge

shanty

house

🏠

small house

cot

villa

izba

bower

summer house

manor house

residence

dacha

convent

closet

small

chamber

bothy

careful

home

🏠

Hyphenated as

cot‧tage

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈkɒtɪd͡ʒ/

Etymology

Late Middle English, from Anglo-Norman cotage and Medieval Latin cotagium, from Old Northern French cot, cote (“hut, cottage”) + -age (“surrounding property”), from Proto-Germanic *kutan, *kuta- (“shed”), probably of non-Indo-European origin, possibly borrowed from Uralic; compare Finnish kota (“hut, house”) and Hungarian ház (“house”), both from Proto-Finno-Ugric/Proto-Uralic *kota. However, also compare Dutch and English hut.
Old Northern French cote is probably from Old Norse kot (“hut”), cognate of Old English cot of same Proto-Germanic origin.
Slang sense “public toilet” from 19th century, due to resemblance.