box office
See also: box-office
English
Alternative forms
- box-office
- boxoffice (less common)
Etymology
1786,[1] presumably from sales of boxes, box seats (“separated private seating”).[2][3] Sense of “total sales” from 1904.[1]
Folk etymology is that this derives from Elizabethan theatre, where theater admission was collected in a box attached to a long stick, passed around the audience.[2][3] However, first attestation is over a century later (theaters were closed in 1642), making this highly unlikely.
Noun
box office (countable and uncountable, plural box offices)
Synonyms
- (place where tickets are sold): ticket office, ticket window
Derived terms
Derived terms
- box-office attraction
- box-office bomb
- box-office receipts
- box-office hit
- box-office success
Translations
ticket office
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References
- “box office” in Douglas Harper, Online Etymology Dictionary, 2001–2019.
- William and Mary Morris, Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins, HarperCollins, New York, 1977, 1988
- Robert Hendrickson, Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins, Facts on File, New York, 1997
- “Re: Box office, box seat”, The Phrase Finder, ESC, March 22, 2002
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