Dictionary

ball-room en · NOUN

Meanings

1. (alt-of, dated) Dated form of ballroom.
   alt of ballroom
   • Clear away! There was nothing they wouldn’t have cleared away, or couldn’t have cleared away, with old Fezziwig looking on. It was done in a minute. Every movable was packed off, as if it were dismissed from public life for evermore; the floor was swept and watered, the lamps were trimmed, fuel was heaped upon the fire; and the warehouse was as snug, and warm, and dry, and bright a ball-room, as you would desire to see upon a winter’s night. 1843 December 19, Charles Dickens, “Stave Two. The First of the Three Spirits.”, in A Christmas Carol. […], London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC, pages 58–59:
   • The boy became volubly friendly and bubbling over with unexpected humour and high spirits. He tried to persuade Cicely to stay away from the ball-room for a fourth dance. Nobody would miss them, he explained. 1909 September 9, Archibald Marshall [pseudonym; Arthur Hammond Marshall], “A Court Ball”, in The Squire’s Daughter, New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead and Company, published 1919, →OCLC, page 9:
   • They were in the ball-room, the violins were playing, and her mind was in a flutter that forbad its fixing on any thing serious. 1814 May 9, [Jane Austen], chapter X, in Mansfield Park: […], volume II, London: […] [George Sidney] for T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC, page 221:
   • It’s really quite a mansion—a great many large rooms: picture-gallery, ball-room, and all that; and the dinner itself was very handsomely done. 1919, Henry B[lake] Fuller, “Cope Dines—and Tells About It”, in Bertram Cope’s Year: A Novel, Chicago, Ill.: Ralph Fletcher Seymour, The Alderbrink Press, →OCLC, page 57:

Forms