house.
A structure built or serving as an abode of human beings.
Meaning & usage
A structure built or serving as an abode of human beings.
This is my house and my family's ancestral home.
A structure built or serving as an abode of human beings. An apartment building within a public housing estate.
A container; a thing which houses another.
Size and quality of residential accommodations; housing.
A building intended to contain a single household, as opposed to an apartment or condominium or building containing these.
The people who live in a house; a household.
A building used for something other than a residence (typically with qualifying word).
The former carriage house had been made over into a guest house.
On arriving at the zoo, we immediately headed for the monkey house.
A building used for something other than a residence (typically with qualifying word). A place of business; a company or organisation, especially a printing press, a publishing company, or a couturier.
A small publishing house would have a contract with an independent fulfillment house.
A building used for something other than a residence (typically with qualifying word). A place of public accommodation or entertainment, especially a public house, an inn, a restaurant, a theatre, or a casino; or the management thereof.
One more, sir, then I'll have to stop serving you – rules of the house, I'm afraid.
The house always wins.
A building used for something other than a residence (typically with qualifying word). A workhouse.
The audience for a live theatrical or similar performance.
After her swan-song, there wasn't a dry eye in the house.
A building where a deliberative assembly meets; whence the assembly itself, particularly a component of a legislature.
The petition was so ridiculous that the house rejected it after minimal debate.
A dynasty; a family with its ancestors and descendants, especially a royal or noble one.
A curse lay upon the House of Atreus.
A place of rest or repose.
A grouping of schoolchildren for the purposes of competition in sports and other activities.
I was a member of Spenser house when I was at school.
An animal's shelter or den, or the shell of an animal such as a snail, used for protection.
One of the twelve divisions of an astrological chart.
The fourth Lenormand card.
A square on a chessboard, regarded as the proper place of a piece.
The four concentric circles where points are scored on the ice.
Lotto; bingo.
A children's game in which the players pretend to be members of a household.
As the babysitter, Emma always acted as the mother whenever the kids demanded to play house.
A small stand of trees in a swamp.
A set of cells in a sudoku puzzle which must contain each digit exactly once, such as a row, column, or 3×3 box.
The end zone.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *(s)kewH-der.? Proto-Germanic *hūsą Proto-West Germanic *hūs Old English hūs Middle English hous English house From Middle English hous, hus, from Old English hūs (“dwelling, shelter, house”), from Proto-West Germanic *hūs, from Proto-Germanic *hūsą (“house”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kews-, from *(s)kewH- (“to cover, hide”). More at hose. Eclipsed non-native Middle English mees, meson, measoun (“house”), borrowed from Anglo-Norman mes, mies, meis, maisun (“house”). The uncommon plural form housen is from Middle English husen, housen. (The Old English nominative plural was simply hūs.) Cognates Cognate with Scots hoose, oos (“house”), Yola heouse, houze, howze (“house”), North Frisian hüs (“house”), Saterland Frisian Huus, Húus (“house”), West Frisian hûs (“house”), Alemannic German hous, hus, husch, hüs, hüüsch (“house”), Bavarian, Cimbrian, Mòcheno haus (“house”), Central Franconian Haus, Hous, Huus (“home”), Dutch huis (“house”), Dutch Low Saxon hoes, huus (“house”), German Haus, Hauß (“house”), German Low German Huus (“house”), Limburgish hoes, Huus (“house”), Luxembourgish Haus (“house”), Vilamovian haojs, haus, hoüz (“house”), Yiddish הויז (hoyz, “house”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish hus (“house”), Elfdalian aus (“house”), Faroese and Icelandic hús (“house”), Crimean Gothic hus (“house”); also Cornish kudha (“to conceal, hide”), Welsh cuddio (“to hide”), Latin cutis (“human skin; hide, leather”), Ancient Greek κεύθω (keúthō, “to cover, hide”), Tocharian A kāc (“hide, skin”), Sanskrit स्कुनाति (skunāti, “to cover”).
To keep within a structure or container.
The car is housed in the garage.
To admit to residence; to harbor.
To take shelter or lodging; to abide; to lodge.
To dwell within one of the twelve astrological houses.
To contain or cover mechanical parts.
To contain one part of an object for the purpose of locating the whole.
The joists were housed into the side walls, rather than being hung from them.
To drive to a shelter.
To deposit and cover, as in the grave.
To stow in a safe place; to take down and make safe.
to house the upper spars
To eat; especially, to scarf down.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English housen, from Old English hūsian, from Proto-Germanic *hūsōną (“to house, live, dwell”), from the noun (see above). Compare Dutch huizen (“to live, dwell, reside”), German Low German husen (“to live, dwell, reside”), German hausen (“to live, dwell, reside”), Norwegian Nynorsk husa (“to house”), Faroese húsa (“to house”), Icelandic húsa (“to shelter, house”).
House music.
Where this word comes from
Probably from The Warehouse, a nightclub in Chicago, Illinois, USA, where the music became popular around 1985.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.