bowery

¹

[ bou-uh-ree ]

adjective

1. containing bowers; bower; leafy; shady:

   a bowery maze.

bowery

²

[ bou-uh-ree, bou-ree ]

noun

, plural bow·er·ies.

1. (among the Dutch settlers of New York) a farm or country seat.
2. the Bowery, a street and area in New York City, historically noted for its cheap hotels and saloons, and populated by people who were destitute and homeless.

Bowery

/ ˈbaʊərɪ /

noun

1. the Bowery
   a street in New York City noted for its cheap hotels and bars, frequented by vagrants and drunks

Bowery

1. A section of lower Manhattan in New York City .

Word History and Origins

Origin of bowery¹

First recorded in 1695–1705; bower ¹ + -y ¹

Origin of bowery²

An Americanism dating back to 1640–50; from Dutch bouwerij “farm,” equivalent to bouw “cultivation” + -erij -ery

Word History and Origins

Origin of bowery¹

C17: from Dutch bouwerij , from bouwen to farm + erij -ery ; see boor , Boer

Example Sentences

I got paid for the article I wrote about him for Bedford + Bowery, a site run in collaboration with New York Magazine.

From Salon

Matt’s struggles came to a dramatic and very public head in January 2023, when he was arrested on weapons charges at the Bowery Hotel in Manhattan after police found two loaded handguns in his room.

From New York Times

“On the Bowery,” the director Lionel Rogosin’s classic portrait of life on skid row, is not only a time capsule of a bygone New York, but also of a bygone form of documentary filmmaking.

From New York Times

“It’s more Lower Manhattan, more Bowery,” Whetstone said.

From Los Angeles Times

He counted himself among the socially marginalized and once joked in a personal letter about “all us miscreants who drifted into the Bowery of Life, the art world.”

From New York Times