hutch

From Middle English hucche (“storage chest”), variation of whucce, from Old English hwiċe, hwiċċe (“box, chest”). Spelling influenced by Old French huche (“chest”), from Medieval Latin hūtica, from a different Germanic root, from Frankish *hutta, from Proto-Germanic *hudjō, *hudjǭ (“box, hut, hutch”). Akin to Old English hȳdan (“to conceal; hide”). More at hide, hut.

• IPA^(key): /hʌtʃ/
• Rhymes: -ʌtʃ

hutch (plural hutches)

1. A cage for keeping rabbits, guinea pigs, etc.
   • 1960, Harper Lee, chapter 16, in To Kill a Mockingbird:

     To reach the courtroom, on the second floor, one passed sundry sunless county cubbyholes: the tax assessor,... the circuit clerk, the judge of probate lived in cool dim hutches that smelled […]

2. A piece of furniture in which items may be displayed.
3. A measure of two Winchester bushels.
4. (mining) The case of a flour bolt.
5. (mining) A car on low wheels, in which coal is drawn in the mine and hoisted out of the pit.
6. (mining) A jig or trough for ore dressing or washing ore.
7. A baker's kneading-trough.

hutch (third-person singular simple present hutches, present participle hutching, simple past and past participle hutched)

1. (transitive) To hoard or lay up, in a chest.
   • Milton

     She hutched the […] ore.

2. (mining, transitive) To wash (ore) in a box or jig.