Other forms: cottages
A cottage is a small cosy house in the countryside. Thick walls, low ceilings, and a garden at the front.
The word carries a great deal of charm with it, which estate agents exploit thoroughly. Originally it meant a labourer's dwelling, which is rather less picturesque than the current sense. It brings a small vocabulary of its own: cottage pie, cottage cheese, a cottage garden and cottage industry, which means work done at home on a small scale. A holiday cottage is one rented by the week.
1nouncottageA small simple house, usually in the country.
“They rented a cottage for the week.”
A cottage is a cot with its grounds. Anglo-Norman cotage joined cote, a hut, to the ending age, which meant the property around it, so the word bundles the building and its patch of land together.
ira-pro
*kátah — house; roof
urj-pro
*kota — hut, tent
Proto-Germanic
*kutą
Old Norse
kot
fro-nor
cot
Medieval Latin
cotagium
Anglo-Norman
cotage
English, today
cottage
Built from
Late Middle English -, from Anglo-Norman cotage and Medieval Latin cotagium, from fro-nor cot, cote (“cottage, hut”) + -age (“surrounding property”), from Old Norse kot, from Proto-Germanic kutą, kuta- (“shed”), probably of non-Indo-European origin, possibly borrowed from fiu-pro -/urj-pro kota (“hut, tent”), probably akin to ira-pro kátah (“house; roof”). However, also compare Dutch and English hut. 2 Cognate with stq Koate (“cottage, hut, small house”), Dutch kot (“ramshackle housing”), German Kate, Kote (“cot, cottage, hut”), Norwegian Bokmål kote (“cot, cottage, hut”), Norwegian Nynorsk kot, kott (“small house; small room”), Norwegian Nynorsk kote, kotto, kåte (“hut”), Swedish kåta (“cot, cottage, hut”), ain コタン (“village; town; island; land; country; place”), sia куэһть (“hut, tent”), brh کڈی (“hut, small house; wife”), myv кудо (“house”), Estonian koda (“building, house”), Finnish kota (“house, hut”), Hungarian ház (“house”), sjd куэдтҍ (“hut”), koi керку (“house, hut”) kpv керка (“house; family”), liv kuodā (“house”), Malayalam കുടി (“dwelling, house; hut; clan”), mdf куд (“house”), mn хот, ᠬᠣᠲᠠ (“city, town”), se goahti (“hut, tent; den, lair”), sma gåetie (“house; range; tent”), Tamil குடி (“ryot; tenants; citizens; family, household; descent, lineage; caste, race; house, mansion; village”), udm корка (“house, hut”), sju gåhtie (“tent”), vot kõta (“house”); also ab ақыҭа (“village; community”), Armenian քաղաք (“city, town”), be, Russian and Ukrainian ха́та (“house, hut”), Czech and Polish chata (“hut”), hac کەَ (“house”), ps کلی (“village”), Persian کده (“house; village”), kmr kedî (“domestic”), yai кат (“house”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA