Originally meaning a public toilet, this seems to be of American origin, with the earliest usages found around In the 18th century, a toilet call was a social interaction in which a lady received visitors while she was in the last stages of performing her toilet.
By the 19th century, we have toilet articles, toilet pail a bucket to hold slops , and toilet paper used for shaving, hair curling, etc. The term toilet room seems to have been American in origin, from the late s, and thence abbreviated to simply toilet.
Again, the word can mean both the room and the device. Wash room. An Americanism from around The term arose around the same time that lavatory was being used for the same place.
Water closet or WC. The water closet was the room with the toilet, whereas the bathroom was the room with the bathtub. In John Phair wrote a book called Observations on the Principle and Construction of Water-Closets, Chimneys, and Bell-Hanging not such a weird combination if you consider that bell wires were usually hung along water-closet pipes.
By the late s it was very modern and fashionable and convenient in England to have an indoor water closet, and indoor plumbing became the rage. Possibly originally referring to the toilet with a replaceable container or can beneath the seat. Dates to roughly These arose around A nice, formal, polite way around the problem. This cloth would be draped over someone while their hair was being groomed.
The word then gained a broader meaning, covering various procedures and routines that involved getting ready for the day ahead. By the twentieth century, the word toilet had lost its former meaning of getting ready in the morning. Boghouse comes from the British slang meaning to defecate, so when you go the bog, you really are being quite literal!
It refers to an outside toilet and is predominantly used in Scotland. Just as toilets are sometimes referred to as the WC an initialism of Water Closet , in the Philippines, toilets are sometimes simply referred to as the CR. If you were unlucky? So, another word for toilet was born. The toilet was located in this part of the ship as the waves would rise up against the bow, washing the waste away. The jacks is Irish slang for toilet, derived from the older English word for toilet jakes.
Shortly after devising the first flushing toilet, he released A New Discourse Upon a Stale Subject: The Metamorphosis of Ajax, a book which got him banished from the Royal court due to his sly digs at the Earl of Leicester and its talk of excrement poisoning the state.
Despite his reputation for causing mischief and calumny with his words, his invention was viewed as a genuine innovation.
Americanism is fairly pervasive here, though, so it's not entirely unheard of to say "I need to go to the bathroom", but it's definitely less common. Australian English often co-opts a bastardisation of both British and American English with some local variation thrown in. For instance we use both "lift" and "elevator" to mean the same thing. I'm Canadian and we most commonly refer to it as the "washroom", which some of my American friends consider weird.
When being informal, "bathroom" is the next most common non-slang term. To look at this from a different aspect and at the risk of duplicating some comments expressed previously , as a southern Brit, I would say:. Sign up to join this community. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top. Stack Overflow for Teams — Collaborate and share knowledge with a private group. Create a free Team What is Teams?
Learn more. Asked 10 years, 10 months ago. Active 3 years, 10 months ago. Viewed k times. This site has brought me to dismiss all of them and use "the gents" , "john", or "jack" , just for the fun of it. In our somewhat uncouth house in the North-East of England this room is generally referred to as the "bog". Only in certain cities or in government buildings. My favorite terms are "the little [boy's girl's] room" and "the important place". The latter from the campfire skit where the spies line up in a row and the head spy asks each of them in turn, "Do you have the important paper?
Active Oldest Votes. That is a difference, and the main one, among all the words you list as well. Don't forget 'the water closet. The head. The can. Also, I've only ever heard "the facilities" and never just "the facility".
It's always "The men's room" vs. Show 5 more comments. In the US we typically say "bathroom" for the room in our home that contains the toilet. John Satta. And he may have actually said "no room where Add a comment.
The room used for defecation is almost always referred to by euphemism. Bathroom In Britain this still means a room containing a bath. Lavatory This used to mean no more than a room used for washing.
Water closet does not refer to a little room, but to the fact that water creates a seal between the foul gases in the drain pipes and the room. Details in en. Show 1 more comment. In terms of social and class issues I was regularly beaten by my parents, and god-parents to say loo, not toilet. Toilet is unbearably common, and good little boys should never use it, apparently.
In a similar way, lavatory is even more plebeian than toilet. Of all international words in current usage, I believe that "toilet" is the one most widely considered non-U all over Europe, including England. A reference: en. I heard things were different across the pond, though.
As soon as the lower classes will have stopped using it, the cycle will be complete, and the upper classes might start using it again. So silly. Cerberus - What made it even sillier was there was a quaint idea that the upper and working classes shared a preference for 'calling a spade a spade' and that only the middle class went in for euphemisms - such cross class solidarity! I've always wondered if the working class saw it in quite the same light.
And of course 'lavatory' is just as much a euphemism as 'toilet'. It's simply Latin euphemism vs French euphemism.
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