toilet

[toi-lit]

noun

1. a bathroom fixture consisting of a bowl, usually with a detachable, hinged seat and lid, and a device for flushing with water, used for defecation and urination.

2. a lavatory.

3. a bathroom.

4. toilet bowl.

5. a dressing room, especially one containing a bath.

6. the act or process of dressing or grooming oneself, including bathing and arranging the hair.

   to make one's toilet; busy at her toilet.

7. toilet set.

8. the dress or costume of a person; any particular costume.

   toilet of white silk.

9. Surgery.,  the cleansing of a part after childbirth or a wound after an operation.

10. Archaic.,  dressing table.

toilet

/ ˈtɔɪlɪt /

noun

1. another word for lavatory

2. old-fashioned,  the act of dressing and preparing oneself

   to make one's toilet

3. old-fashioned,  a dressing table or the articles used when making one's toilet

4. rare,  costume

5. the cleansing of a wound, etc, after an operation or childbirth

Word History and Origins

Origin of toilet¹

1530–40; < French toilette small cloth, doily, dressing table, equivalent to toile toil ² + -ette -et

Word History and Origins

Origin of toilet¹

C16: from French toilette dress, from _toile

Idioms and Phrases

Idioms

1. go down / in the toilet, to become worthless or profitless; be doomed.

   The team's entire season went down the toilet.

Example Sentences

"As a leader, much of my day is spent chasing works, reporting leaks, faulty toilets, broken windows - whilst essential, this should not be my primary focus," she told BBC News NI.

Read more on BBC

If two patients, for example, are delirious upon waking from surgery, they both need someone to sit by their bedsides, even as a third or fourth patient may need assistance walking to the toilet.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

That included exhausted Palestinian doctors and nurses, many of whom had lost family members, been displaced from their homes and were living in crowded tent cities where hundreds of people shared a single toilet.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

But scrubbing public toilets isn’t Fito’s idea of an alternative course.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

“One of the GMCs we rented had a hole in the petrol tank and the chemical toilet wouldn’t flush properly.”

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• latrine 
• lavatory 
• outhouse 
• restroom