What does chauffer mean?
A chauffer is a small furnace or stove designed to heat water, typically one that supplies hot water for a laundry, brewery, distillery, or comparable domestic or industrial setting. The word belongs chiefly to technical and historical vocabulary: it appears most often in accounts of Victorian and earlier buildings, where a coal- or wood-fired chauffer stood in a basement or washhouse to keep water at working temperature. In modern English it is uncommon, and readers are far more likely to know its near-homograph chauffeur, meaning a hired driver — a confusion encouraged by the single-letter difference between them. Chauffer derives from French chauffer, 'to heat', ultimately from Latin calor, 'heat', making it a sibling of words such as chafe and calorie. For anyone reading historical descriptions of laundries, breweries, or grand households, knowing the word clarifies exactly what piece of equipment is being described.
nounA small furnace or stove used for heating water, especially one supplying hot water for laundry, brewing, or similar domestic and industrial purposes.
- A small furnace or stove for heating water, used in laundries, breweries, and other settings requiring a supply of hot water.
"The old laundry was heated by a coal-fired chauffer in the basement."
"The brewery's chauffer supplied a steady flow of hot water for the mash tuns."
"Victorian laundries relied on a cast-iron chauffer to keep wash water at temperature."
Regular plural formation.
"The estate's two chauffers worked around the clock during the busy season."
Add one letter to 'chauffer' and you get 'chauffeur' — the difference between a hot-water stove and someone who drives your car.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of chauffer
Chauffer comes from French chauffer, meaning 'to heat', which descends from the Latin verb calefacere, 'to make warm', built on calor, 'heat'. English borrowed the term as a noun denoting a heating apparatus, particularly a water-heating stove. It shares this warm root with chafe, calorie, and chauffeur — the latter originally meaning a stoker who tended an engine's fire before it came to denote a driver.
How chauffer is actually used
Chauffer is a rare, largely technical or historical term today, encountered mainly in descriptions of older buildings and trades. It should not be confused with the much more common word chauffeur.
Easily confused with chauffer
A chauffeur is a person hired to drive a private car, while a chauffer is a small water-heating furnace; the two words differ by only one letter but mean entirely different things.