Commode

<h2 id="history-and-types">History and types</h2>
<h3>France</h3>
The term originates in the vocabulary of <a href="/facts/French_furniture/DAkFuyKT">French furniture</a> from about 1700. At that time, a commode meant a <a href="/facts/Cabinet_(furniture)/NaT8nXS0">cabinet</a> or <a href="/facts/Chest_of_drawers/lqRhfPmT">chest of drawers</a>, low enough so that it sat at the height of the <a href="/facts/Dado_rail/4Dj21K1P">dado rail</a> (à hauteur d'appui). It was a piece of <a href="/facts/Wood_veneer/HluaU5Yt">veneered</a> <a href="/facts/Casegoods/NaT8nXS0">case furniture</a> much wider than it was high, raised on high or low legs.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:3" href="#fn:3">3</a>
Commodes were made by <a href="/facts/%25C3%2589b%25C3%25A9niste/soMEy5oQ">ébénistes</a>; the French word for "<a href="/facts/Cabinet-maker/NaT8nXS0">cabinet-maker</a>" is derived from <a href="/facts/Ebony/nwh4jDzM">ebony</a>, a black tropical <a href="/facts/Hardwood/KQT6MN8W">hardwood</a> notable as a foreign luxury. The beautiful wood was complemented with <a href="/facts/Ormolu/fzbUnF94">ormolu</a> (gilt-bronze <a href="/facts/Drawer_pull/KIqCLwKY">drawer pulls</a>). The piece of furniture would be provided with a marble slab top<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:4" href="#fn:4">4</a> selected to match the marble of the <a href="/facts/Chimneypiece/d0uRLQKd">chimneypiece</a>.
A commode occupied a prominent position in the room for which it was intended: it stood against the <a href="/facts/Pier_(architecture)/r75BDQB0">pier</a> between the windows,<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:5" href="#fn:5">5</a> in which case it would often be surmounted by a mirror glass,<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:6" href="#fn:6">6</a> or a pair of identical commodes would flank the chimneypiece or occupy the center of each end wall.
Bombé commodes, with surfaces shaped in three dimensions, were a feature of the <a href="/facts/Rococo/eyKstITz">rococo</a> style called <a href="/facts/Style_Louis_XV/qxNgMPs9">Louis Quinze</a>. Rectilinear neoclassical, or <a href="/facts/Style_Louis_XVI/AGgsIYRh">Louis Seize</a>, commodes might have such deep drawers or doors that the feet were en toupie—in the tapering <a href="/facts/Woodturning/uNQCoLtf">turned shape</a> of a child's <a href="/facts/Spinning_top/u50YUBP6">spinning top</a>. Both rococo and neoclassical commodes might have cabinets flanking the main section, in which case such a piece was a commode à encoignures;<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:7" href="#fn:7">7</a> pairs of <a href="/facts/Encoignure/wSLutQr0">encoignures</a> or corner-cabinets might also be designed to complement a commode and stand in the flanking corners of a room. If a commode had open shelves flanking the main section it was a commode à l'anglaise; if it did not have enclosing <a href="/facts/Drawer_(furniture)/oxobWYU9">drawers</a> it was a commode à vantaux.
Before the mid-eighteenth century the commode had become such a necessary article of furniture that it might be made in menuiserie (carpentry), of solid painted oak, walnut or fruitwoods, with carved decoration, typical of <a href="/facts/French_provincial_furniture/DAkFuyKT">French provincial furniture</a>.

<h3>England</h3>

In the English-speaking world, commode passed into cabinet-makers' parlance <a href="/facts/18th-century_London/WgSz3z1j">in London by the mid-eighteenth century</a> to describe <a href="/facts/Chest_of_drawers/lqRhfPmT">chests of drawers</a> with gracefully curved fronts, and sometimes with shaped sides as well, perceived as being in the "French" taste. <a href="/facts/Thomas_Chippendale/bwpj4zrD">Thomas Chippendale</a> employed the term "French Commode Tables" to describe designs in The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Director (1753), and <a href="/facts/Ince_and_Mayhew/7hJwMxUh">Ince and Mayhew</a> illustrated a "Commode Chest of drawers", plate xliii, in their Universal System of Household Furniture, 1759–62. <a href="/facts/John_Gloag/knaI4m42">John Gloag</a> notes<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:8" href="#fn:8">8</a> that Commode expanded to describe any piece of furniture with <a href="/facts/Serpentine_shape/22F6TnXb">a serpentine front</a>, such as a <a href="/facts/Dressing_table/8xUtVP1M">dressing table</a>, or even a chair seat.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:9" href="#fn:9">9</a> Gloag points out that <a href="/facts/Thomas_Shearer/gJMXe7c1">Thomas Shearer</a>'s designs for two "commode dressing chests" illustrated in The Cabinet-Makers' London Book of Prices, 1788, plate 17, are repeated, but as "serpentine dressing chests", in The Prices of Cabinet Work, 1797 edition.

<h2 id="toilet">Toilet</h2>

In <a href="/facts/British_English/ymJR5Rnd">British English</a>, "commode" is the standard term for a <a href="/facts/Commode_chair/alRqL099">commode chair</a>, often on wheels, enclosing a <a href="/facts/Chamber_pot/eXexGCoz">chamber pot</a>—as used in hospitals and the homes of disabled persons.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:10" href="#fn:10">10</a> (The historic equivalent is the <a href="/facts/Close_stool/FaeDKTYf">close stool</a>, hence the coveted and prestigious position <a href="/facts/Groom_of_the_Stool/pLyx677L">Groom of the Stool</a> for a courtier close to the monarch.) This piece of furniture is termed in French a chaise percée ("pierced chair"); similar items were made specifically as moveable <a href="/facts/Bidet/QDYVFP7M">bidets</a> for washing.

In the United States, a "commode" is a colloquial synonym for a <a href="/facts/Flush_toilet/84csAWYE">flush toilet</a><a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:11" href="#fn:11">11</a> particularly in the <a href="/facts/Southern_United_States/ppnGuAtB">American South</a>.
<h2 id="see-also">See also</h2>
<ul><li><a href="/facts/Nightstand/KLu3APEV">Nightstand</a>, a small table or similar next to a bed</li>
<li><a href="/facts/Lowboy/8xUtVP1M">Lowboy</a> and <a href="/facts/Highboy/PjRenLvV">highboy</a></li></ul>

Look up commode in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

<h2 id="references">References</h2>

<ol>
<li id="fn:1">"Cambridge Dictionaries online, entry for Commode". Retrieved 20 January 2013. <a href="http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/commode?q=commode" target="_blank">http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/commode?q=commode</a> <a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:2">Robinson, Melia (June 1, 2017). "I tried the 'Mercedes Benz of toilets' that comes with a remote control and costs $10,200". Business Insider. Retrieved 23 November 2017. ...But Japan's biggest toilet maker has brought these high-tech features and more to its premiere line of commodes. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/toto-neorest-750h-toilet-review-and-photos-2017-5" target="_blank">http://www.businessinsider.com/toto-neorest-750h-toilet-review-and-photos-2017-5</a> <a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:3">A commode with a divided drawer above two deep ones was a commode en tombeau— a "monumental commode"— or, in retrospect, a commode à la Régence. <a href="/wiki/R%C3%A9gence" target="_blank">/wiki/R%C3%A9gence</a> <a href="#fnref:3" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:4">The slab might be veneered with a fine or rare marble, such as a breccia; its edges might be moulded. <a href="/wiki/Breccia" target="_blank">/wiki/Breccia</a> <a href="#fnref:4" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:5">Such a piece, when made particularly shallow, not to impede passage along the enfilade that connected rooms might be called a demi-commode (Francis J. B. Watson, Louis XVI Furniture 1973, fig.fig. 27). <a href="/wiki/Enfilade" target="_blank">/wiki/Enfilade</a> <a href="#fnref:5" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:6">"In a room with three windows, for instance, one could place between them a commode with drawers and one with drawers, while still preserving an essential symmetry." (Pierre Verlet, French Furniture and Interior Decoration of the 18th Century, 1967) p. 154) <a href="#fnref:6" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:7">Francis J. B. Watson, Louis XVI Furniture 1973, illustrates as commodes à encoignures the commode by Gilles Joubert and Roger Vandercruse La Croix, 1769 for Mme Victoire at Compiègne (fig. 23 (Frick Collection, New York); the commode by Joubert for Mme Adelaide at Versailles, 1769 (fig. 24, Getty Museum, Los Angeles); the unusually rich and monumental commode by Jean-Henri Riesener for the king's bedroom at Versailles, 1775 (fig. 32, Musée Condé, Chantilly). <a href="/wiki/Francis_J._B._Watson" target="_blank">/wiki/Francis_J._B._Watson</a> <a href="#fnref:7" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:8">Gloag, A Short Dictionary of Furniture , rev. ed. 1969, s.v. "Commode, "Commode Front". <a href="#fnref:8" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:9">Richard Magrath, a cabinet-maker and upholsterer in Charleston, South Carolina, advertised for sale in 1771 ""Half a Dozen Caned Chairs, a Couch to match them, with commode fronts, and Pincushion seats." (Noted in Gloag, op. cit, s.v. "Commode Front"). <a href="/wiki/Charleston,_South_Carolina" target="_blank">/wiki/Charleston,_South_Carolina</a> <a href="#fnref:9" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:10">"Cambridge Dictionaries online, entry for Commode". Retrieved 20 January 2013. <a href="http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/commode?q=commode" target="_blank">http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/commode?q=commode</a> <a href="#fnref:10" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:11">Robinson, Melia (June 1, 2017). "I tried the 'Mercedes Benz of toilets' that comes with a remote control and costs $10,200". Business Insider. Retrieved 23 November 2017. ...But Japan's biggest toilet maker has brought these high-tech features and more to its premiere line of commodes. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/toto-neorest-750h-toilet-review-and-photos-2017-5" target="_blank">http://www.businessinsider.com/toto-neorest-750h-toilet-review-and-photos-2017-5</a> <a href="#fnref:11" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></li>
</ol>

Commode open-in-new

Commode