Nightclub

How to spell nightclub

9 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce nightclub

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does nightclub mean?

1. nounA venue open late at night where people go to drink, dance, and hear music.

Nightclub in a sentence

• The nightclub stayed open until three in the morning.

• They queued outside the nightclub waiting for the doors to open.

Where does nightclub come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a transparent English compound formed from two old words. 'Night' descends from Old English 'niht', a Germanic word for the dark period between sunset and dawn, with close relatives in German 'Nacht' and Dutch 'nacht'. 'Club' is the more surprising half: it first meant a heavy stick (borrowed from Old Norse 'klubba', a cudgel), and only later came to mean a group of people who 'clubbed together', perhaps from the idea of a thick clustered mass. By the early twentieth century the two words were joined to describe a venue open late into the night for drinking, dancing, and entertainment. The compound is written solid, with no space and no hyphen, which is the main thing to remember when spelling it.

How the word is built

• night (the dark hours after sunset)
• club (an association or its venue)