Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A closed four-wheeled carriage with an open driver's seat in front.
  • noun An automobile with an open driver's seat.
  • noun An electrically powered automobile resembling a coupé.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A four-wheeled close carriage, with one or two horses, and adapted to carry either two or four persons.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A light, enclosed carriage, with seats inside for two or four, and the fore wheels so arranged as to turn short.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A four-wheeled horse-drawn carriage, designed in 1839. It had an open seat for the driver in front of the closed cabin for two or four passengers.
  • noun An automobile, a sedan without a roof over the driver's seat.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a sedan that has no roof over the driver's seat
  • noun light carriage; pulled by a single horse

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[After Henry Peter Brougham, First Baron Brougham and Vaux (1778–1868), Scottish-born jurist.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Named from Henry Peter, Lord Brougham (1778–1868), who either invented or popularized the vehicle.

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Examples

  • Will you come out with me now – my brougham will be at the door directly – and I'll take you to a confectioner and let you choose for yourself?

    The Boys and I: A Child's Story for Children 1883

  • The brougham was a token of harmony, of the fine conditions papa would this time offer: he had usually come for her in a hansom, with a four-wheeler behind for the boxes.

    What Maisie Knew Henry James 1879

  • I am not the first doctor who has coined his brougham at night.

    A Simpleton Charles Reade 1849

  • He smokes almost incessantly … It is now no uncommon thing to see a man in evening dress smoking in a brougham with a lady on their way to opera, theatre, or dinner engagement.

    Smoking Etiquette | Edwardian Promenade 2010

  • I stopped the carriage, got out, and, after a few minutes 'conversation, persuaded two of the public women to get into the brougham with me.

    Chapter 7: The Bishop's Vision 2010

  • I was in my brougham, driving through the streets.

    Chapter 7: The Bishop's Vision 2010

  • Though I wailed and screamed, kicked and punched, they separated us, throwing me into the brougham carriage, which took off at once for police headquarters.

    The Curse of the Wendigo William James Henry 2010

  • We followed him to a brougham carriage waiting at the curb.

    The Curse of the Wendigo William James Henry 2010

  • Though I wailed and screamed, kicked and punched, they separated us, throwing me into the brougham carriage, which took off at once for police headquarters.

    The Curse of the Wendigo William James Henry 2010

  • We followed him to a brougham carriage waiting at the curb.

    The Curse of the Wendigo William James Henry 2010

Comments

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  • Hackney cars, cabs, delivery waggons, mail-vans, private broughams, aerated mineral water floats with rattling crates of bottles, rattled, lolled, horsedrawn, rapidly.

    Joyce, Ulysses, 7

    January 2, 2007

  • Usage on barouche.

    October 22, 2008

  • "A little farther up Fifth Avenue, Beaufort appeared on his doorstep, darkly projected against a blaze of light, descended to his private brougham, and rolled away to a mysterious and probably unmentionable destination."

    - Edith Wharton, 'The Age of Innocence'.

    September 19, 2009

  • Verb: to be transported by such a carriage. Tenses:broughamed, broughammed, broughamming, broughaming, broughams.

    December 25, 2017