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bower

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bower¹

  • /baʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /baʊəɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊəɹ/ UK

Rhymes with -aʊ.ə(ɹ), -aʊə(ɹ), -əʊə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

From Middle English bour, from Old English būr, from Proto-West Germanic *būr, from Proto-Germanic *būrą (“room, abode”).

Cognate with Saterland Frisian Búur (“storage room, utility room; cage”), German Bauer (“birdcage”), Old Norse búr (“cage”) (Danish bur, Norwegian Bokmål bur, Swedish bur).

noun bowers · bowre

  1. A bedroom or private apartments, especially for a woman in a medieval castle. Give me my lute in bed now as I lie, / And lock the doors of mine unlucky bower.
  2. literary A dwelling; a picturesque country cottage, especially one that is used as a retreat. While friends arrived in circles gay, To visit Damon's bower
  3. A shady, leafy shelter or recess in a garden or woods. […]say that thou overheard'st us, And bid her steal into the pleached bower, Where honey-suckles, ripen'd by the sun, Forbid the sun to enter;[…]
  4. A large structure made of grass, twigs, etc., and decorated with bright objects, used by male bower birds during courtship displays.

Similar: boudoir

verb bowers · bowering · bowered

  1. To embower; to enclose. O nature, what hadst thou to do in hell / When thou didst bower the spirit of a fiend / In mortal paradise of such sweet flesh?
  2. obsolete To lodge. Flora now calleth forth each flower, And bids make readie Maias bower

bower²

  • /baʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /baʊəɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊəɹ/ UK

Rhymes with -aʊ.ə(ɹ), -aʊə(ɹ), -əʊə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

From Middle English boueer, from Old English būr, ġebūr (“freeholder of the lowest class, peasant, farmer”) and Middle Dutch bouwer (“farmer, builder, peasant”); both from Proto-West Germanic *būr, from Proto-Germanic *būraz (“dweller”), from or related to *būaną (“to dwell”).

Cognates

Cognate with North Frisian Buur, böre, büür (“farmer”), Alemannic German pour, pur, Puur, pür (“farmer”), Dutch boer, bouwer (“farmer”), buur (“neighbour”), German and Luxembourgish Bauer (“farmer”), Low German Buer, Buur (“farmer”), Mòcheno pauer (“farmer”), Vilamovian pauer, pojer, poüer (“farmer”), Yiddish פּויער (poyer, “farmer”); also Albanian burr, burrë (“man; husband; brave male; lord”). Doublet of bauer, Boer, and boor. More at neighbour.

noun bowers

  1. A peasant; a farmer.

bower³

  • /baʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /baʊəɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊəɹ/ UK

Rhymes with -aʊ.ə(ɹ), -aʊə(ɹ), -əʊə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

From German Bauer. A doublet of etymology 2 and of the German-origin surname Bauer.

noun bowers

  1. Either of the two highest trumps in the card games euchre and five hundred (where the joker is omitted). Yet the cards they were stocked / In a way that I grieve, / And my feelings were shocked / At the state of Nye's sleeve, / Which was stuffed full of aces and bowers, / And the same with intent to deceive.

bower⁴

  • /baʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /baʊəɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊəɹ/ UK

Rhymes with -aʊ.ə(ɹ), -aʊə(ɹ), -əʊə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

From the bow of a ship + -er.

noun bowers

  1. A type of ship's anchor, carried at the bow.

bower⁵

  • /baʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /baʊəɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊəɹ/ UK

Rhymes with -aʊ.ə(ɹ), -aʊə(ɹ), -əʊə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

From bow (verb) + -er.

noun bowers

  1. One who bows or bends. The bower aims his display straight at the dominant figure, who may reciprocate with a milder version of the same action.
  2. A muscle that bends a limb, especially the arm. His rawbone armes, whose mighty brawned bowrs / Were wont to riue steele plates, and helmets hew

bower⁶

  • /baʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /baʊəɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊəɹ/ UK

Rhymes with -aʊ.ə(ɹ), -aʊə(ɹ), -əʊə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

From bow (noun) + -er.

noun bowers

  1. One who plays any of several bow instruments, such as the musical bow or diddley bow.

bower⁷

  • /baʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /baʊəɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊ.əɹ/ UK
  • /bəʊəɹ/ UK

Rhymes with -aʊ.ə(ɹ), -aʊə(ɹ), -əʊə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

From bough + -er, compare brancher.

noun bowers · bougher

  1. A young hawk, when it begins to leave the nest.

Bower⁸

  • /ˈbaʊə(ɹ)/
  • /ˈbəʊə(ɹ)/

proper noun

  1. A surname. Snowdon climbed to the top floor of the house opposite George's in Pimlico to observe the artist in one window and his model, the painter Natalie Bower, in the adjacent.

Thesaurus

Closest in meaning: arbour, embower, arbor, pergola, nott, havering, atte, gazebo, summerhouse, alcove, refuge, nest, covert, nook, grotto, retreat

noun

Similar: boudoir

Translations

Every language

noun a woman's bedroom or private apartments, especially in a medieval castle

Españoltocador, camarín
中文閨房 /闺房 guīfáng
Françaisboudoir
DeutschBoudoir, Frauengemach, Kemenate
Ελληνικάμπουντουάρ bountouár
Русскийбудуа́р buduár

noun (literary) A dwelling; a picturesque country cottage

DeutschSommerhaus, Landhaus, Landhäuschen

noun a leafy shelter or recess in a garden or woods

हिन्दीनिकुंज nikuñj
DeutschGartenlaube, Laube, schattiges Plätzchen
Ελληνικάκληματαριά klimatariá, αναδενδράδα anadendráda
עבריתסֻכָּה sukká

noun (ornithology) A large structure made of grass and bright objects

DeutschLaube

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Cite this
MLA

"bower." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/bower. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

bower. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/bower

Chicago

"bower." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/bower.

BibTeX
@misc{bower_2026,
  title = {bower},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/bower},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}