Eldergays why are there so many words for sofa?
Christopher Lucas 
Couch, divan, settee, chesterfield, etc. I know there's more. Same with cutlery, silverware, flatware, utensils.
Are all these words necessary or can we retire some?
| by Anonymous | reply 64 | May 7, 2023 9:27 PM |
Keep your filthy mitts off my settee!
| by Anonymous | reply 3 | April 30, 2023 11:16 PM |
Davenport sounds like a porch couch.
| by Anonymous | reply 4 | April 30, 2023 11:18 PM |
Because they are specific words for specific usages which most people use collectively irrespective of the use.
| by Anonymous | reply 5 | April 30, 2023 11:19 PM |
We used chesterfield quite often when I was a kid. Must have been a manufacturer? Now we say sofa or more often couch. Altho I did have a chaise longue for a few years.
| by Anonymous | reply 6 | April 30, 2023 11:21 PM |
A chesterfield is a style of sofa, you fucking rubes.
| by Anonymous | reply 7 | April 30, 2023 11:24 PM |
The number of words for bathroom are nearly infinite. Washroom, throne room, biffy, shitter, powder room, loo, can, head, pisser, outhouse, latrine, privy, etc.
| by Anonymous | reply 8 | April 30, 2023 11:33 PM |
R7 so is a davenport. But a sofa is a couch.
| by Anonymous | reply 10 | April 30, 2023 11:34 PM |
Because you're a fucking rube, R9.
| by Anonymous | reply 11 | April 30, 2023 11:36 PM |
I didn't have a sofa growing up.
| by Anonymous | reply 12 | April 30, 2023 11:37 PM |
R7 and no one said otherwise
| by Anonymous | reply 13 | April 30, 2023 11:37 PM |
Because no one seemed to know that, R13.
| by Anonymous | reply 14 | April 30, 2023 11:39 PM |
Here you go, girls. Educate yourselves.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 15 | April 30, 2023 11:40 PM |
Maybe household items that are used every day, everywhere have more synonyms than infrequently used items.
| by Anonymous | reply 17 | April 30, 2023 11:42 PM |
R16, R15 is for you, too.
| by Anonymous | reply 18 | April 30, 2023 11:42 PM |
R17, furniture is not "household items."
| by Anonymous | reply 19 | April 30, 2023 11:43 PM |
A divan and a settee are different from sofas/couches/davenports.
So are fainting couches.
| by Anonymous | reply 20 | April 30, 2023 11:47 PM |
[quote] "Because they are specific words for specific usages which most people use collectively irrespective of the use."
Beat me to it, R5.
| by Anonymous | reply 21 | April 30, 2023 11:47 PM |
Interesting. Chesterfield place name etymology from Latin means: Old English ceaster (Roman fort) and feld (pasture). So a place if space. Please, visitor, come sit on my place of space.
| by Anonymous | reply 22 | April 30, 2023 11:48 PM |
Um...I have several items of furniture in my house. The are definitely household items. Not sure about anyone else.
| by Anonymous | reply 23 | April 30, 2023 11:50 PM |
Household items are coffee machines and toasters and electric toothbrushes, R23.
| by Anonymous | reply 24 | April 30, 2023 11:51 PM |
I am still unravelling Fall vs. Autumn.
| by Anonymous | reply 25 | April 30, 2023 11:57 PM |
[quote] can we retire some?
That's a doubleplusgood idea, OP.
| by Anonymous | reply 27 | May 1, 2023 12:06 AM |
I call the couch my livelihood.
| by Anonymous | reply 28 | May 1, 2023 1:12 AM |
[quote]Household items are coffee machines and toasters and electric toothbrushes
Those are electronics / appliances.
| by Anonymous | reply 29 | May 1, 2023 2:05 AM |
"The casting Chesterfield" just doesn't have the same ring to it.
| by Anonymous | reply 30 | May 1, 2023 2:12 AM |
R29, no one refers to their furniture as their household items.
| by Anonymous | reply 31 | May 1, 2023 2:15 AM |
And no one calls a couch a chesterfield.
| by Anonymous | reply 32 | May 1, 2023 2:27 AM |
Well, according to Trent Conway in Six Degrees of Separation, don't say couch if you want to sound high-end. Say sofa.
| by Anonymous | reply 33 | May 1, 2023 2:35 AM |
I don't have room for a couch or chesterfield but I do have a loveseat.
| by Anonymous | reply 34 | May 1, 2023 2:59 AM |
Chesterfield are big in Canada (or they were when I grew up).
| by Anonymous | reply 35 | May 1, 2023 3:00 AM |
They are all slightly different things. No one knows what the differences are tho
| by Anonymous | reply 37 | May 1, 2023 3:01 AM |
I prefer to call my household items, including furniture, chattels.
| by Anonymous | reply 38 | May 1, 2023 3:03 AM |
And what, pray tell, is a "tho," r37? Short for "thofa"?
| by Anonymous | reply 39 | May 1, 2023 3:07 AM |
R39 Tho is short for though. I'm sure you don't use that word in your suburbian home with white picket fence and a family golden retriever.
| by Anonymous | reply 40 | May 1, 2023 3:11 AM |
"Suburbian," r40? You really don't like to spell at all.
| by Anonymous | reply 41 | May 1, 2023 3:15 AM |
R41 I'm from Croatia and had German as my second language in school I learned English watching tv shows and cartoons as a kid.. I would love to hear how good your knowledge of Croatian is. Show us....
| by Anonymous | reply 42 | May 1, 2023 3:20 AM |
I used to have a sectional. It was also a curved couch and a sofa bed.
"Curved sofas are sometimes called crescent sofas or conversation sofas."
Is there no end to the categories of couches?
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 43 | May 1, 2023 3:21 AM |
Oh, the old, "English is my third language" excuse.
| by Anonymous | reply 45 | May 1, 2023 3:29 AM |
[quote]your suburbian home with white picket fence and a family golden retriever.
It will be an apartment, no yard and a small yappy dog.
| by Anonymous | reply 46 | May 1, 2023 3:38 AM |
I think r42 is a picka as well.
| by Anonymous | reply 47 | May 1, 2023 7:21 AM |
R47 Bolje picka nego kurac
| by Anonymous | reply 49 | May 1, 2023 5:18 PM |
We're old. We forget what things are called, so we call them something else.
| by Anonymous | reply 50 | May 1, 2023 5:24 PM |
When it comes to other words for sofa, the only one I'd jettison is "squab."
| by Anonymous | reply 51 | May 1, 2023 8:29 PM |
"Daveno" is reportedly the Pacific Northwest name for a sofa. But I heard it first on an early episode of Homicide: Life on the Street, in which Detective Beau Felton talks about the daveno on which a dead body lies. He also made reference to Natty Bo (National Bohemian Beer), Billytown, and other Baltimore hallmarks over the years.
| by Anonymous | reply 52 | May 1, 2023 9:21 PM |
R49, Samo kad si seronja od početka.
| by Anonymous | reply 53 | May 1, 2023 10:52 PM |
R53 Nemam pojma o čemu bljujes
| by Anonymous | reply 54 | May 1, 2023 11:37 PM |
Always thought a sofa was upholstered, a couch isn't. I was corrected by a designer when I said "wall-to-wall carpeting." He said "all carpeting is wall-to-wall. Everything else is a rug."
| by Anonymous | reply 55 | May 1, 2023 11:46 PM |
Davenport is the largest city in Iowa.
| by Anonymous | reply 56 | May 1, 2023 11:47 PM |
Old folks talk about a Credenza. They don't mean bookcase?
| by Anonymous | reply 57 | May 1, 2023 11:49 PM |
Family Guy made fun of this.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 58 | May 1, 2023 11:51 PM |
Some of the words had different meanings which have been lost. A couch originally had no back.
| by Anonymous | reply 59 | May 2, 2023 3:53 AM |
Davenport and divan are words I was aware of as a child, but I don’t remember anyone actually using them as a term for sofa or couch in normal conversation. These are words that I imagined belonging in the distant past, like something people would have used in the 1920s.
Divan comes from a Turkish word for a backless couch back as far as the 16th century. Davenport was a furniture manufacturer in Massachusetts, and the word became a generic term for sofa for a while, like Kleenex for tissue or (in the UK) Hoover for vacuum.
My grandma always referred to a toilet as a commode, and that usage confused me later when I heard of someone getting a beautiful antique French commode for her boudoir. I didn’t know a toilet could be that fancy or that you’d want to keep it in your bedroom.
| by Anonymous | reply 60 | May 2, 2023 4:26 AM |
R60, I'm sitting on an Ottoman, his name is Kruk.
| by Anonymous | reply 61 | May 2, 2023 8:22 AM |
A chifforobe (/ˈʃɪfəˌroʊb/), also chiffarobe or chifferobe, is a closet-like piece of furniture that combines a long space for hanging clothes (that is, a wardrobe or armoire) with a chest of drawers).[1] Typically the wardrobe section runs down one side of the piece, while the drawers occupy the other side.[2] It may have two enclosing doors or have the drawer fronts exposed and a separate door for the hanging space
| by Anonymous | reply 62 | May 7, 2023 9:05 PM |
It's only ever been a sofa or couch I'm my life.
[quote]Altho I did have a chaise longue for a few years.
Did you entertain gentlemen callers in your negligee? Is your name Lindsey?
| by Anonymous | reply 63 | May 7, 2023 9:19 PM |
Op there are many words for asshole too
| by Anonymous | reply 64 | May 7, 2023 9:27 PM |
