four-poster

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four-poster (not comparable)

1. (attributive, of a bed) Having four vertical columns, one in each corner, that support a tester, so that curtains can be hung to exclude draughts from the sleeper.
   • 1960, P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves in the Offing, chapter VIII:

     The furnishing of this Blue Room was solid and Victorian, it having been the GHQ of my Uncle Tom's late father, who liked things substantial. There was a four-poster bed, [...]

four-poster (plural four-posters)

1. A four-poster bed, which has four high posts, one at each corner, supporting a canopy.

   Synonym: four-poster bed

   • 1948, Truman Capote, Other Voices, Other Rooms, Part One, 2:

     ... the bed, an immense four-poster with different rosewood fruits carved crudely on its high headboard, was suffocatingly soft and his body had sunk deep in its feathery center.

   • 1971, Gwen White, Antique Toys And Their Background, page 214:

     Wooden beds were made as replicas of large ones, some carved in walnut, others in mahogany and with elaborate head-pieces. There were four-posters draped with curtains to pull and bedspreads to match, much beautiful hand-sewing and embroidery going to their manufacture.

• canopy bed