the.com/hoarding
the slow construction of a fortress from things you swore you'd use someday.
means The compulsive accumulation and refusal to discard possessions, often well past the point of usefulness — whether stockpiling goods or piling up clutter.
from From the Old English 'hord,' meaning a treasure or store laid away, with Germanic cousins like the Old High German 'hort.' The same root that once described a dragon's gleaming pile of gold now describes a spare room full of empty jars — the treasure stayed, the gleam negotiable. The verb 'to hoard' grew naturally from the noun, and the '-ing' simply caught the act in progress. (Note: this is unrelated to the British 'hoarding' meaning a large advertising billboard, which comes from a different and obscure source.)
- recognized disorder
- Officially classified as distinct from OCD in 2013.
- brain scans
- Decision-making regions light up abnormally over personal items.
- animal version
- Squirrels forget most buried nuts, accidentally planting forests.
- fatal risk
- Cluttered homes triple the danger during fires.
- british meaning
- In the UK, a hoarding is just a billboard.
collyer brothers — two new york recluses whose manhattan townhouse contained 140 tons of accumulated items when cleared in 1947
sandra cowart's house — greensboro, north carolina home so filled with belongings that the roof collapsed and the structure was demolished in 2002
langley moore — new york recluse whose packed mansion required a 9-ton crane to extract him in 1965