Bottom The House Meaning
(idiomatic, dated) To clean a house from top to bottom; to clean a house extremely thoroughly
Example: 1957, Richard Hoggart, The Uses of Literacy[1], ISBN 9780765804211:
The half-length lace curtains keep out most of what little sun there is, but they establish your privacy: the window-ledges and doorsteps scrubbed and yellowed with scouring-stone further establish that you are a 'decent' family, that you believe in 'bottoming' the house each week.
1978, Colin Gordon, A richer dust: echoes from an Edwardian album[2]:
She had 'bottomed' the house (ie spring-cleaned) and cooked specially for me.
1985, The Raving Beauties, editors, No holds barred[3], ISBN 9780704339637:
My mother-in-law pickled walnuts
and covered floors in rag rugs
she bottomed the house each spring
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