Dutch billy
Dutch billy noun: a kind of terraced house with distinctive curved gables, formerly common in Dublin and other Irish towns.
Noun
Dutch billy (plural Dutch billies)
- A kind of terraced house with distinctive curved gables, formerly common in Dublin and other Irish towns.
- They were ready to be superseded on their sites at the end of the seventeeth century by what we call the "Dutch Billy" houses.1889, Thomas Drew, “Unhealthiness of Dublin Barracks”, in The Builder, volume 56, number 2398, page 54
- The term Dutch Billy refers to gable-fronted houses built in the late 17th and early 18th centuries – not just in Dublin, but also Cork, Drogheda, Limerick and Waterford – by waves of Huguenot and Quaker immigrants as well as tradesmen from Britain.2011, Frank McDonald, “Dutch Billy 18th century houses at risk”, in The Irish Times
Forms of Dutch billy
| plural | Dutch billies |
|---|
Origin of Dutch billy
Apparently a transferred use of Dutch Billy, a nickname for William III (applied to the houses on account of their Dutch appearance).
Questions about Dutch billy
- What does Dutch billy mean?
- Dutch billy means a kind of terraced house with distinctive curved gables, formerly common in Dublin and other Irish towns.
- What part of speech is Dutch billy?
- Dutch billy is a noun.
- What is the plural of Dutch billy?
- The plural of Dutch billy is Dutch billies.
Words near Dutch billy in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: Dutch billy (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this entry: “Dutch billy.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dutch_billy. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.