# house

Pronunciation: say "HOWS" /haʊs/

## Noun

1. A building for people to live in, especially one for a single household rather than a flat or unit in a larger building.
   - Simple: A building that people live in, usually one family, not a flat in a bigger building.
   - _They bought a house with a big garden just outside town._
   - _We're having dinner at my house on Saturday, if you'd like to come._
2. A building where a lawmaking assembly meets, or the assembly itself, especially one chamber of a legislature.
   - Simple: A group of people who meet to make a country's laws, or the building where they meet.
   - _The lower house debated the budget for three days._
   - _The bill passed the house by a narrow margin._
3. The size and quality of the living space a home offers, treated as an amount of housing.
   - Simple: How big and how good the place where someone lives is.
   - _First-time buyers are often tempted to take on more house than their income can support._
   - _After the kids moved out, the couple realized they had far too much house to heat and clean._
5. A building used for some purpose other than living in, usually named with a describing word.
   - Simple: A building used for a special purpose, not for living in.
   - _The estate included an old carriage house that had been turned into a garage._
   - _Workers gathered each morning at the engine house beside the mine._
6. A place of public accommodation or entertainment, especially a pub, inn, restaurant, theater, or casino, or the management running it.
   - Simple: A public place to eat, drink, stay, or have fun, like a bar, inn, or casino, or the people running it.
   - _Over a long night at the blackjack table, the house holds a steady edge over every player._
   - _The new owners turned the failing inn into the busiest house in town._
7. A business or company, especially a printing press, a publishing company, or a fashion designer.
   - Simple: A company or business, especially one that prints, publishes, or makes fashion.
   - _A respected publishing house rejected the manuscript twice before it found a home._
   - _The banking house had financed trade across the continent for generations._
8. The group of people who live together under one roof; a household.
   - Simple: All the people who live together in one home.
   - _A noise that loud could wake the entire house._
   - _She kept the house running smoothly while her husband was away at sea._
11. A container; something that holds or encloses another thing.
   - Simple: A container or part that holds and protects another thing.
12. A dynasty; a family line, especially a royal or noble one, traced through its ancestors and descendants.
   - Simple: A royal or noble family, including its ancestors and children.
   - _The House of Habsburg dominated European politics for centuries._
   - _Two rival houses fought for control of the throne._
13. A genre of electronic dance music built on a steady four-on-the-floor beat, repetitive rhythms, and synthesized basslines.
   - Simple: A kind of electronic dance music with a steady, repeating beat.
   - _The DJ blended classic house with newer electronic tracks all evening._
   - _Chicago clubs were where house first found its audience._
14. The audience attending a live theatrical or similar performance, considered as a group.
   - Simple: All the people watching a show in a theater.
   - _The performers walked out to a cheering house._
   - _A quiet house can make even a seasoned actor nervous._
15. A group of schoolchildren organized as a team for competition in sports and other activities.
   - Simple: A team that students belong to at school, used for sports and other contests.
   - _Every student is assigned to a house when they enroll._
   - _The four houses competed fiercely at the annual sports day._
16. An animal's shelter or den, or the protective shell of a creature such as a snail.
   - Simple: A shelter, den, or shell that protects an animal.
   - _The tortoise withdrew into its house at the first sign of danger._
   - _We built the rabbits a little wooden house behind the garage._
17. A make-believe game in which children take on the roles of people in a household, such as parents and children.
   - Simple: A game where children act out being a family at home.
   - _On rainy days the children played house under the kitchen table._
   - _They laid out dolls and toy dishes to play house all morning._
20. Any one of the twelve sections into which an astrological chart is divided.
   - Simple: One of the twelve parts of a star chart, each standing for an area of life like money, love, or work.
   - _She checked which house the moon was in before reading the chart aloud._
   - _A planet sitting on the line between two houses is harder to interpret._
22. The four concentric circles on the ice where points are scored in curling.
   - Simple: In curling, the round target on the ice where teams score points.
   - _The skip aimed to draw her stone gently into the house._
   - _Only stones resting in the house count toward the score._
23. In American football, the end zone. *(slang)*
   - Simple: In football, the end area where a team scores a touchdown.
   - _She watched him carry the kickoff all the way to the house._
   - _Nothing could stop the running back from reaching the house._
24. A place that offers rest or repose.
   - Simple: A place where someone can rest and feel calm.
25. The game of lotto or bingo.
   - Simple: A game of chance played with numbered cards and called-out numbers, also known as bingo.
27. In a sudoku puzzle, a set of cells (such as a row, column, or 3×3 box) that must contain each digit exactly once.
   - Simple: In sudoku, a line or box of cells that must hold each number just once.
   - _A single row forms one house, so each digit can appear in it only once._
   - _Solvers scan each house to find the only place a given digit can go._
28. A workhouse, a public institution where the poor were given food and shelter in exchange for labor.
   - Simple: In the past, a place where poor people lived and worked in return for food and shelter.
   - _With no work and no family to help, the old widow had to go into the house, where she scrubbed floors for her keep._
   - _The parish ran the house on the edge of town, where paupers picked oakum in return for their bread._

## Verb

Pronunciation: say "HOWZ" /haʊz/

4. To keep or store something within a structure or container.
   - Simple: To keep or store something inside a building or container.
   - _The new wing will house the library's rare manuscripts._
   - _A single climate-controlled warehouse houses the entire collection._
10. To take someone in to live somewhere; to give shelter to.
   - Simple: To let someone live somewhere or give them a place to stay.
   - _The monastery housed travelers who arrived after nightfall._
   - _The city scrambled to house everyone left homeless by the storm._
18. To take shelter or lodging; to stay or dwell somewhere.
   - Simple: To stay somewhere for shelter or rest.
19. To contain one part of an object so as to fix the position of the whole.
   - Simple: To hold one part of a thing in place so the whole sits correctly.
   - _Carpenters house the tenon in a matching slot to align the frame._
   - _The mortise houses the tenon and keeps the rail from twisting._
21. To eat something, especially to gulp it down quickly. *(slang, Canada, US)*
   - Simple: To eat something very fast and finish all of it.
   - _They housed the entire tray of nachos in minutes._
   - _I could house an entire pizza by myself right now._
26. To stow something in a safe place; to take it down and make it secure.
   - Simple: To put something away safely, or take it down and make it secure.
   - _They housed the anchor properly before leaving port._
   - _Deckhands house the topmast in heavy weather._

## Adjective

9. Provided, produced, or owned by a specific restaurant, bar, club, or other business as its own.
   - Simple: Made, served, or owned by a restaurant, bar, club, or other business as its own.
   - _We ordered a carafe of the house red to go with dinner._
   - _The club's house band plays every Friday until two in the morning._

## Other meanings

- (noun) Any residential block of apartments forming part of a public housing estate.
- (noun) In the Lenormand fortune-telling deck, card number four, which pictures a house.
- (noun) The chessboard square thought of as the rightful spot for a particular piece.
- (noun) A small grove growing on a patch of swampland.
- (verb) Of a planet, to be placed in a particular section of an astrological chart, of which there are twelve.
- (verb) To chase or herd people or animals into a place of shelter.
- (verb) To put something away and cover it over, as when burying the dead.

## Origin

**Meanings 1–3, 5–9, 11–12, 14–17, 20, 22–25, 27–28** — Proto-Germanic *hūsą, which may go back to Proto-Indo-European *(s)kewH- ("to cover, hide"), became Proto-West Germanic *hūs and then Old English hūs, meaning "dwelling, shelter, house." Middle English had it as hous. Dutch huis, German Haus, and Swedish hus are relatives.
**Meanings 4, 10, 18–19, 21, 26** — The verb grew out of the noun house. Proto-Germanic *hūsōną, meaning "to house, live, dwell," led to Old English hūsian and then Middle English housen. Dutch huizen and German hausen ("to live, dwell") are comparable verbs.
**Meaning 13** — The style was most likely named for The Warehouse, a Chicago dance club in the state of Illinois, United States, where it caught on in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/house (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).