Other forms: bivouacs
A bivouac is a rough shelter used for one night in the open. Make a bivouac, bivouac on the ridge, a cold bivouac.
It is improvised and temporary, with no tent or with a bag only, which is what separates it from a camp. In mountaineering an unplanned one is a serious matter and the phrase for it is a forced bivouac. Note the spelling, and that the word came from a Swiss German term for an extra night watch.
1nounbivouacA rough shelter used for one night in the open.
“Caught by darkness on the mountain, the climbers made a bivouac on a narrow ledge.”
bivouac is a shelter.
The German behind it is a watch: soldiers awake in the open all night. A bivouac is that camp, meant for one night and no more.
hooks ontowatch
Swiss German Biiwacht means an additional watch, from bii, by, plus Wacht, a watch. French took it as bivouac.
gsw
Biiwacht — reinforcements of guard or town watch
French
bivouac
English, today
bivouac
Built from
French bivouac (earlier biouac, bivac), from gsw Biiwacht (“reinforcements of guard or town watch”), from bii- + Wacht (“watch, guard”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA