Meanings
- uncountableA place to sleep and eat; bed and breakfast; the services provided by an inn or similar establishment.
1 more example
For, alas, the Ideal always has to grow in the Real, and to seek out its bed and board there, often in a very sorry way. No beautifullest Poet is a Bird-of-Paradise, living on perfumes; sleeping in the aether with outspread wings. The Heroic, independent of bed and board, is found in Drury Lane Theatre only
1843 April, Thomas Carlyle, “ch. 4, Abbot Hugo”, in Past and Present, American edition, Boston, Mass.: Charles C[offin] Little and James Brown, published 1843, →OCLC, book II (The Ancient Monk)
Synonyms & antonyms
Origin
- Middle Englishbed and bord
- Englishbed and board
From Middle English bed and bord.
More words from Middle English
Full word history & related roots →Translations
German Kost und Logis, Tisch und Bett
- Kost und LogisA place to sleep and eat
- Tisch und BettConnubial relations
Spanish cama y alojamiento
- cama y alojamientoA place to sleep and eat
Cite this entry
bed and board. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/bed%20and%20board
“bed and board.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/bed%20and%20board. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “bed and board,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/bed%20and%20board.
Source: bed and board on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.