the.com/hovel
A shack so humble it makes a barn look like a penthouse.
means A hovel is a small, wretchedly built dwelling — cramped, dirty, and barely fit to live in.
from From Middle English 'hovel,' meaning a shed or open shelter for animals or storage. Its deeper roots are uncertain — possibly a diminutive related to 'hof,' an old word for an enclosure or yard, but the trail goes cold before we can be sure. Originally just a humble outbuilding, it slid downhill over the centuries until it came to mean any miserable little hut a person was unlucky enough to call home.
- medieval roots
- Once meant an open shed for livestock
- poetic favorite
- Shakespeare's King Lear sheltered in one
- size insult
- Now slang for any cramped, grim dwelling
- single vowel away
- Add a letter and you're shoveling out