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Cabinet vs Cupboard - What's the difference?

cabinet | cupboard |

Cupboard is a synonym of cabinet.



In obsolete terms the difference between cabinet and cupboard

is that cabinet is a hut; a cottage; a small house while cupboard is a table or sideboard on which to display or store cups, dishes etc.

As nouns the difference between cabinet and cupboard

is that cabinet is a storage closet either separate from, or built into, a wall while cupboard is an enclosed storage space with a door, usually having shelves, used to store crockery, food, etc.

As a verb cupboard is

to collect, as into a cupboard; to hoard.

cabinet

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • A storage closet either separate from, or built into, a wall.
  • (New England) cupboard
  • * {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham)
  • , title=(The China Governess) , chapter=3 citation , passage=‘[…] There's every Staffordshire crime-piece ever made in this cabinet , and that's unique. The Van Hoyer Museum in New York hasn't that very rare second version of Maria Marten's Red Barn over there, nor the little Frederick George Manning—he was the criminal Dickens saw hanged on the roof of the gaol in Horsemonger Lane, by the way—’}}
  • (historical) A size of photograph, specifically one measuring 3?" by 5½".
  • * 1891 , , A Scandal In Bohemia , Norton (2005), p. 19,
  • Holmes took a note of it. “One other question,” said he. “Was the photograph a cabinet ?”
  • A group of advisors to a government or business entity.
  • (politics, often, capitalized) In parliamentary and some other systems of government, the group of ministers responsible for creating government policy and for overseeing the departments comprising the executive branch.
  • (archaic) A small chamber or private room.
  • * Prescott
  • Philip passed some hours every day in his father's cabinet.
  • (often capitalized) A collection of art or ethnographic objects.
  • (dialectal, Rhode Island) Milkshake.
  • (obsolete) A hut; a cottage; a small house.
  • * Spenser
  • Hearken a while from thy green cabinet , / The rural song of careful Colinet.

    See also

    * armoire * kitchen cabinet * salon

    Anagrams

    * ----

    cupboard

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An enclosed storage space with a door, usually having shelves, used to store crockery, food, etc.
  • Put the cups in the cupboard .
  • * {{quote-book, year=1932, author=
  • , title=Friday's Business , chapter=20 citation , passage=Eurydice pointed to the cupboard , and sat down on the low divan with folded hands, and looked at the floor.}}
  • *
  • (obsolete) A table or sideboard on which to display or store cups, dishes etc.
  • Synonyms

    * closet (US) * press * wardrobe (British)

    Derived terms

    * airing cupboard * cupboardlike * cupboard love * cupboardy * fume cupboard * hot cupboard * skeleton in the cupboard

    See also

    * armoire * sideboard

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To collect, as into a cupboard; to hoard.
  • * 1608 , , I. i. 98:
  • Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing / Like labour with the rest,
    1000 English basic words