landau

noun

four-wheeled open boat-shaped carriage with two doors, two facing benches for four to six persons, with convertible hood on both sides and seperate raised bench. Primarily for passenger transport

Pronunciation: /ˈlændaʊ/ / /ˈlændɔː/ / /ˈlæn.dɔː/ / /ˈlæn.daʊ/

Etymology: From German Landau.

Etymology: Named after the German city of Landau, where such carriages were first made. Compare German Landauer.

A type of lightweight, four-wheeled carriage in which the front and back passenger seats face each other.
“Indeed, as the two gentlemen reached the door, a landau drove up, a magnificent yellow carriage, lined with brocade or satin of a faint cream colour, drawn by wonderful grey horses, with flaming ribbons, and harness blazing all over with crests: no less than three of these heraldic emblems surmounted the coats-of-arms on the panels, and these shields contained a prodigious number of quarterings, betokening the antiquity and splendour of the house of Clavering and Snell.”
“On an early winter afternoon, clear but not cold, when the vegetable world was a weird multitude of skeletons through whose ribs the sun shone freely, a gleaming landau came to a pause on the crest of a hill in Wessex.”
A style of automobile based around the design of landau carriages.