Farmtown

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A small rural settlement whose economy and daily life revolve around the farms surrounding it
2. A community of agricultural families and businesses that exists to serve the farmland nearby
3. A village or small town where farming is the main activity and the local population works the land

Etymology: "Farmtown" is a compound of "farm" and "town," and the plain story is that both parts are old English words that were joined in American English to name a particular kind of settlement. The "farm" element comes from Old French "ferme," a lease or rent, which English adopted and used for land let out to a tenant for payment. The "town" element descends from Old English "tun," meaning an enclosure or homestead, which later came to mean a settled community. The combined word describes a cluster of farm households living together in a village rather than scattered across their fields, a settlement pattern found in many parts of the world. Its meaning is transparent from its parts, so it has no dramatic shift in sense to report. Its exact first recorded date is not something I can confirm from the available source.