lodger

Etymology

It is formed from English lodge + -er.^[2][3][4][5] The verb is from Middle English loggen, from Old French logier (“to lodge, find lodging for”), from loge (“hut, cabin”),^[3][2] which goes back to Frankish *laubja (“shelter”), from Proto-Germanic *laubja-.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A dweller in a tent: before 1300, in the Cursor Mundi.^[2][4] Etymonline also finds it as a surname about 1200 and in this sense in the early 14th century,^[3] while Merriam-Webster Unabridged and Dictionary.com place the first use in the 13th century.^[6][5]

Semantic evolution

The first sense follows the early meaning of the verb, to encamp, and it did not outlast Middle English.^[3][2][4] From 1511 a lodger was anyone staying or living in a place, or passing a night there, a use now archaic,^[2][4][6] and between 1533 and 1665 the word could also point the other way, to the person who gives lodging, a host.^[2] The sense that survives, someone paying to live in another person's house, appears in Shakespeare's Henry V: "nor shall my Nell keep lodgers".^[7][2] Etymonline dates it to the 1590s,^[3] and Johnson (1755) put this meaning first.^[7] The lodger-franchise was a right to vote conferred in 1867 on occupiers of lodgings above a set annual rent.^[4] A lodger could also be a thing that sticks fast in a place, from the 19th century,^[2][4] and slang used it for head lice, rats, mice and other vermin, recorded from 1889,^[8] for an insignificant person^[8] and for the penis.^[8]

Timeline

• before 1300 – a dweller in a tent (now obsolete).^[2]
• 1511 – someone living or passing the night in a place (now archaic).^[2]
• 1533 – a host (obsolete by 1665).^[2]
• before 1616 – someone who pays to live in another person's house, in Shakespeare's Henry V.^[2] Etymonline dates this sense to the 1590s.^[3]
• 1868 – a thing that lodges or becomes fixed in a place.^[2]
• 1889 – in the plural, slang for head lice and other vermin.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person who pays to live in part of someone else's house; a tenant of a room: The widow let her top floor to a lodger.^[9][6][2]
2. Specifically, someone whose arrangement with the owner gives no interest in or possession of the housing.^[6]
3. A thing that lodges or becomes fixed in a place.^[2][4]
4. (slang) In the plural, head lice, rats, mice or other vermin.^[8]
5. (archaic) Someone who lives in a place, or passes a night there; an occupant.^[6][2][4]
6. (obsolete, before 1300) A dweller in a tent.^[2][4]
7. (obsolete, 1533–1665) A person who gives lodging; a host.^[2][4]

Related words

• lodge
• lodging
• lodgment
• loggia
• lobby
• logistics

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
8. ^ a b c d e Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
9. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins