courtroom

Etymology

It is a compound from English court + room.^[2][3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A room next to a courtyard: 1659, in Samuel Lee's Orbis Miraculum; this sense is obsolete.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

The first recorded use took court in its sense of an enclosed yard.^[2][5] The current sense, a room in which a court of law sits, is first found in 1677 in the records of the court of New Castle on Delaware,^[2] the date Merriam-Webster gives;^[6] Etymonline and Dictionary.com date it to the 1670s.^[3][4]

Timeline

• 1659 – a room adjoining a courtyard (obsolete).^[2][5]
• 1677 – a room in which a court of law meets.^[2][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A room in which a court of law sits and cases are heard: Reporters crowded into the courtroom for the verdict.^[7][6][8]
2. The part of a courthouse in which trials and hearings take place.^[9]

Related words

• court
• room
• courthouse
• courtyard

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
5. ^ a b c Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
6. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
9. ^ Garner, Bryan A., ed. (2004), Black's Law Dictionary, 8th ed., St. Paul, Minn.: Thomson West