bed

See also: Appendix:Variations of "bed"

English

Etymology

From Middle English bed, bedde, from Old English bedd, from Proto-West Germanic *badi, from Proto-Germanic *badją (“resting-place, plot of ground”).

cognates

Cognate with North Frisian baad, beed, Saterland Frisian Bääd, West Frisian bêd, Low German Bedd, Dutch bed, German Bett, Swedish bädd, Icelandic beður, all meaning “bed”.

further possible etymology and cognates

The Proto-Germanic term may in turn be from Proto-Indo-European *bʰedʰ- (“to dig”) with various theories explaining the development in meaning. If it is, the term is also cognate with Ancient Greek βοθυρος (bothuros, “pit”), Latin fossa (“ditch”), Latvian bedre (“hole”), Welsh bedd (“grave”), Breton bez (“grave”); and probably also Russian бодать (bodatʹ, “to butt, gore”).

Pronunciation

(Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /bɛd/
- Audio (UK): (file)
- Audio (General American): (file)
(African-American Vernacular, some speakers) IPA^(key): [beː]
(General Australian) IPA^(key): /bed/
Rhymes: -ɛd

Noun

bed (plural beds)

A piece of furniture, usually flat and soft, on which to rest or sleep.
My cat often sleeps on my bed.

I keep a glass of water next to my bed when I sleep.
- 1762, Charles Johnstone, The Reverie; or, A Flight to the Paradise of Fools, volume 2, Dublin: Printed by Dillon Chamberlaine, →OCLC, page 202:
  At length, one night, when the company by ſome accident broke up much ſooner than ordinary, ſo that the candles were not half burnt out, ſhe was not able to reſiſt the temptation, but reſolved to have them ſome way or other. Accordingly, as ſoon as the hurry was over, and the ſervants, as ſhe thought, all gone to ſleep, ſhe ſtole out of her bed, and went down ſtairs, naked to her ſhift as ſhe was, with a deſign to ſteal them […].
1. A prepared spot in which to spend the night.
  When camping, he usually makes a bed for the night from hay and a blanket.
2. (usually after a preposition) One's place of sleep or rest.
  Go to bed!
  
  I had breakfast in bed this morning.
3. (uncountable, usually after a preposition) Sleep; rest; getting to sleep.
  He's been afraid of bed since he saw the scary film.
4. (uncountable, usually after a preposition) The time for going to sleep or resting in bed; bedtime.
  I read until bed.
5. (uncountable) Time spent in a bed.
  - 1903, Thomas Stretch Dowse, Lectures on Massage and Electricity in the Treatment of Disease, page 276:
    I am quite sure that too much bed, if not too much sleep, is prejudicial, though a certain amount is absolutely necessary.
  - 1907, Jabez Spencer Balfour, My Prison Life, page 181:
    Some prisoners, indeed, are always up before the bell rings — such was my practice — they prefer to grope about in the dark to tossing about in the utter weariness of too much bed.
  - 1972, James Verney Cable, Principles of Medicine: An Integrated Textbook for Nurses:
    This condition is one of the dangers of “too much bed”. The nurse should inspect the legs of each patient daily
6. (figurative) Marriage.
  - 1702–1704, Edward [Hyde, 1st] Earl of Clarendon, “(please specify |book=I to XVI)”, in The History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England, Begun in the Year 1641. […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed at the Theater, published 1707, →OCLC:
    George, the eldest son of his second bed.
7. (figurative, uncountable) Sexual activity.
  Too much bed, not enough rest.
8. Clipping of bedroom.
  2 beds, 1 bath
A place, or flat surface or layer, on which something else rests or is laid.
The meats and cheeses lay on a bed of lettuce.
1. The bottom of a body of water, such as an ocean, sea, lake, or river. [from later 16^thc.]
  sea bed
  
  river bed
  
  There’s a lot of trash on the bed of the river.
2. An area where a large number of oysters, mussels, other sessile shellfish, or a large amount of seaweed is found.
  Oysters are farmed from their beds.
  - 1941, Emily Carr, chapter 18, in Klee Wyck‎^[1]:
    I knew that there were kelp beds and reefs which could rip the bottoms from boats down in Skedans Bay.
3. A garden plot.
  We added a new bush to our rose bed.
  - 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, “Afterglow”, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC, page 168:
    Breezes blowing from beds of iris quickened her breath with their perfume; she saw the tufted lilacs sway in the wind, and the streamers of mauve-tinted wistaria swinging, all a-glisten with golden bees; she saw a crimson cardinal winging through the foliage, and amorous tanagers flashing like scarlet flames athwart the pines.
4. A foundation or supporting surface formed of a fluid.
  A bed of concrete makes a strong subsurface for an asphalt parking lot.
5. The superficial earthwork, or ballast, of a railroad.
7. The platform of a truck, trailer, wagon, railcar, or other vehicle that supports the load to be hauled.
  Synonym: tray
  
  Hyponym: truckbed
  
  The parcels were loaded onto the truck bed before transportation.
8. A shaped piece of timber to hold a cask clear of a ship’s floor; a pallet.
9. (printing, dated) The flat part of the press, on which the form is laid.
10. (computing) The flat surface of a scanner on which a document is placed to be scanned.
11. A piece of music, normally instrumental, over which a radio DJ talks.
12. (darts) Any of the sections of a dartboard with a point value, delimited by a wire.
13. (trampoline) The taut surface of a trampoline.
  - 2000, Sports: The Complete Visual Reference‎^[2]:
    These 5 judges mark the athlete's staying in the center of the bed, uniformity of bounce heights, and general style.
(heading) A horizontal layer or surface.
1. A deposit of ore, coal, etc.
2. (geology) The smallest division of a geologic formation or stratigraphic rock series marked by well-defined divisional planes (bedding planes) separating it from layers above and below.
  Synonyms: layer, stratum
3. (masonry) The horizontal surface of a building stone.
  the upper and lower beds
4. (masonry) The lower surface of a brick, slate, or tile.^[1]
5. (masonry) A course of stone or brick in a wall.

Usage notes

To prepare a bed (in the sense of sleeping furniture) is usually to make the bed, or (Southern US) to spread the bed, the verb spread probably having been developed from bedspread.

Like many nouns denoting places where people spend time, bed requires no article after certain prepositions: hence in bed (“lying in a bed”), go to bed (“get into a bed”), and so on. The forms in a bed, etc. do exist, but tend to imply mere presence in the bed, without it being for the purpose of sleep.

Derived terms

Descendants

→ Chichewa: bedi
→ Chuukese: pet
→ Esperanto: bedo
→ Japanese: ベッド (beddo)

Translations

See bed/translations § Noun.

Verb

bed (third-person singular simple present beds, present participle bedding, simple past and past participle bedded)

Senses relating to a bed as a place for resting or sleeping.
1. (intransitive) To go to bed; to put oneself to sleep.
  I usually listen to music before I bed.
2. (transitive) To place in a bed.
  - 1622, Francis, Lord Verulam, Viscount St. Alban [i.e. Francis Bacon], The Historie of the Raigne of King Henry the Seventh, […], London: […] W[illiam] Stansby for Matthew Lownes, and William Barret, →OCLC:
    For she was not only publicly contracted, but stated as a bride, and solemnly bedded, and after she was laid, there came in Maximilian's ambassador with letters of procuration
3. (transitive) To furnish with a bed or bedding.
4. (transitive, intransitive) To have sex (with). [from early 14th c.]
  Synonyms: coitize, go to bed with, sleep with; see also Thesaurus:copulate with
  - 1730, William Forbes, The Institutes of the Law of Scotland, page 121:
    And he who lies with another Man's Wife after she is married, even before her Husband had bedded with her, is guilty of Adultery, […]
5. (intransitive, hunting) Of large game animals: to be at rest.
Senses relating to a bed as a place or layer on which something else rests or is laid.
1. (transitive) To lay or put in any hollow place, or place of rest and security, surrounded or enclosed; to embed.
  - 1810/1835, William Wordsworth, Guide to the Lakes
    Among all chains or clusters of mountains where large bodies of still water are bedded.
  - 2014 August 17, Jeff Howell, “Home improvements: Repairing and replacing floorboards [print version: Never buy anything from a salesman, 16 August 2014, p. P7]”, in The Daily Telegraph (Property)‎^[3]:
    But I must warn you that chipboard floors are always likely to squeak. The material is still being used in new-builds, but developers now use adhesive to bed and joint it, rather than screws or nails. I suspect the adhesive will eventually embrittle and crack, resulting in the same squeaking problems as before.
2. (transitive) To set in a soft matrix, as paving stones in sand, or tiles in cement.
3. (transitive) To set out (plants) in a garden bed.
4. (transitive) To dress or prepare the surface of (stone) so it can serve as a bed.
5. (transitive) To lay flat; to lay in order; to place in a horizontal or recumbent position.
  - c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iv]:
    Your bedded hair like life in excrements
6. To settle, as machinery.

Derived terms

Translations

See bed/translations § Verb.

References

^ Edward H[enry] Knight (1877) “Bed”, in Knight’s American Mechanical Dictionary. […], volumes I (A–GAS), New York, N.Y.: Hurd and Houghton […], →OCLC.

Anagrams

BDE, DBE, DEB, Deb, Deb., EBD, Edb., deb

Afrikaans

Etymology

From Dutch bed, from Middle Dutch bedde, from Old Dutch bedde, from Proto-Germanic *badją.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /bɛt/
Audio: (file)

Noun

bed (plural beddens, diminutive bedjie)

bed
Synonym: kooi

Australian Kriol

Etymology 1

From English bird.

Noun

bed

bird

Etymology 2

From English bed.

Noun

bed

bed

Breton

Alternative forms

béd (Skolveurieg)

Etymology

From Proto-Brythonic *bɨd, from Proto-Celtic *bitus. Cognates include Welsh byd and Cornish bys.

Noun

bed m (plural bedoù)

Mutation

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Mutation of bed

Breton consonant mutation
	unmutated	soft	aspirate	hard
singular	bed	ved	unchanged	ped
plural	bedoù	vedoù	unchanged	pedoù

References

Ian Press (1986) A grammar of modern Breton, Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, →ISBN, page 322

Danish

Etymology 1

From German Beet (“bed for plants”), originally the same word as Bett (“bed for sleeping”), from Proto-Germanic *badją, cognate with English bed and Swedish bädd.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): [ˈb̥eð]

Noun

bed n (singular definite bedet, plural indefinite bede)

bed (a garden plot)

Inflection

Declension of bed

neuter gender	Singular		Plural
neuter gender	indefinite	definite	indefinite	definite
nominative	bed	bedet	bede	bedene
genitive	beds	bedets	bedes	bedenes

Etymology 2

From Old Norse beit f (“pasturage”), Old Norse beita f (“bait”), from Proto-Germanic *baitō (“food, bait”), cognate with German Beize (“mordant”) (whence Danish bejdse).

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): [ˈb̥eˀð], [ˈb̥eðˀ]

Noun

bed (definitive plural bedene)

(obsolete) pasturage
only in the expression: gå nogen i bedene "poach on someone's preserves"

Etymology 3

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): [ˈb̥eˀð], [ˈb̥eðˀ]

Verb

bed

past of bide

Etymology 4

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): [ˈb̥eˀ], (solemnly) IPA^(key): [ˈb̥eˀð], [ˈb̥eðˀ]

Verb

bed

imperative of bede

Dutch

Etymology

From Middle Dutch bedde, from Old Dutch bedde, from Proto-West Germanic *badi, from Proto-Germanic *badją.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /bɛt/
Audio: (file)
Hyphenation: bed
Rhymes: -ɛt

Noun

bed n (plural bedden, diminutive bedje n)

bed (furniture for sleeping)
Ze kocht een nieuw bed voor haar nieuwe appartement. ― She bought a new bed for her new apartment.

Ik wil vroeg naar bed gaan vanavond. ― I want to go to bed early tonight.

Dit bed is zo comfortabel dat ik er de hele dag in zou kunnen blijven. ― This bed is so comfortable, I could stay in it all day.
(garden, agriculture) patch, bed
layer, often a substratum
bed of a body of water
- 1950, Willy van der Heide, Drie jongens op een onbewoond eiland, Stenvert:
  Op een gegeven ogenblik stieten ze op een uitgedroogde beekbedding; het bed van de beek was naakte lava.
  (please add an English translation of this quotation)

Derived terms

Descendants

Afrikaans: bed
Berbice Creole Dutch: bedi
Negerhollands: bet, bedi, bere, bedde
- → Virgin Islands Creole: bedi (archaic)
Skepi Creole Dutch: bede
→ Caribbean Javanese: bèt
→? Mohegan-Pequot: beed
→ Papiamentu: bèt, bèchi, bèrchi, bed
→ Saramaccan: bédi
→? Sranan Tongo: bedi
- → Caribbean Hindustani: bedi
- → Caribbean Javanese: bèḍi
- → Kari'na: bedi

Middle English

Etymology 1

From Old English bedd.

Noun

bed

bed

Descendants

English: bed
Scots: bed

Etymology 2

Noun

bed

Alternative form of bede

Northern Kurdish

Pronunciation

Rhymes: -ɛd

Adjective

bed

bad

Norwegian Bokmål

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /beːd/

Etymology 1

From Danish bed, from German Beet.

Noun

bed n (definite singular bedet, indefinite plural bed, definite plural beda or bedene)

(horticulture) a bed (for plants)

Derived terms

blomsterbed

Etymology 2

Verb

bed

imperative of bede

References

“bed” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology 1

From German Beet.

Noun

bed n (definite singular bedet, indefinite plural bed, definite plural beda)

(horticulture) a bed (for plants)

Derived terms

blomsterbed

Etymology 2

Verb

bed

present tense of beda
imperative of beda

Etymology 3

From Old Norse beðr.

Noun

bed m (definite singular beden, indefinite plural bedar, definite plural bedane)

(pre-2012) alternative form of bedd

References

“bed” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

Old English

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /bed/

Noun

bed n

Alternative form of bedd

Old Irish

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /bʲeð/

Etymology 1

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Verb

·bed

third-person singular past subjunctive of at·tá

Alternative forms

·beth

Etymology 2

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Verb

bed

inflection of is:

Alternative forms

bad (3 sg. past subj.; 3 sg. and 2 pl. imperative)

Mutation

Old Irish mutation
Radical	Lenition	Nasalization
bed	bed pronounced with /β(ʲ)-/	mbed
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.

Old Saxon

Alternative forms

bedd, beddi

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *badi, from Proto-Germanic *badją (“dug sleeping-place”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰedʰ- (“to dig”).

Cognate with Old Frisian bed, Old English bedd, Dutch bed, Old High German betti, Old Norse beðr, Gothic 𐌱𐌰𐌳𐌹 (badi). The Indo-European root is also the source of Ancient Greek βοθυρος (bothuros, “pit”), Latin fossa (“ditch”), Latvian bedre (“hole”), Welsh bedd, Breton bez (“grave”).

Noun

bed n

bed
- (Can we date this quote?), Heliand, verse 2309:
  thena lefna lamon bārun mid is beddiu
  They were bearing the living lame man with his bed

Declension

Declension of bed (neuter a-stem)

	singular	plural
nominative	bed	bed
accusative	bed	bed
genitive	beddes	beddō
dative	bedde	beddum
instrumental	—	—

Descendants

Middle Low German: bedde
- Low German: Bett
  - Dutch Low Saxon: bedde
  - German Low German: Bedd
    - Plautdietsch: Bad, Bed
- → Icelandic: beddi

Swedish

Verb

bed (contracted be)

imperative of bedja

Volapük

Etymology

Borrowed from English bed and German Bett.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /bed/

Noun

bed (nominative plural beds)

bed

Declension

declension of bed

	singular	plural
nominative	bed	beds
genitive	beda	bedas
dative	bede	bedes
accusative	bedi	bedis
vocative ¹	o bed!	o beds!
predicative ²	bedu	bedus

¹ status as a case is disputed
² in later, non-classical Volapük only

[1] Edward H[enry] Knight (1877) “Bed”, in Knight’s American Mechanical Dictionary. […], volumes I (A–GAS), New York, N.Y.: Hurd and Houghton […], →OCLC.

[1]

bed

English

Etymology

Pronunciation

Noun

Usage notes

Derived terms

Descendants

Translations

Verb

Derived terms

Translations

References

Further reading

Anagrams

Afrikaans

Etymology

Pronunciation

Noun

Australian Kriol

Etymology 1

Noun

Etymology 2

Noun

Breton

Alternative forms

Etymology

Noun

Mutation

References

Danish

Etymology 1

Pronunciation

Noun

Inflection

Etymology 2

Pronunciation

Noun

Etymology 3

Pronunciation

Verb

Etymology 4

Pronunciation

Verb

Dutch

Etymology

Pronunciation

Noun

Derived terms

Descendants

Middle English

Etymology 1

Noun

Descendants

Etymology 2

Noun

Northern Kurdish

Pronunciation

Adjective

Norwegian Bokmål

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

Noun

Derived terms

Etymology 2

Verb

References

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology 1

Noun

Derived terms

Etymology 2

Verb

Etymology 3

Noun

References

Old English

Pronunciation

Noun

Old Irish