Britzka

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A britzka or brichka is a type of horse-drawn carriage. It was a long carriage with four wheels, with a folding top over the rear seat and a rear-facing front seat, and was pulled by two horses. Its size made it suitable for use as a 19th century equivalent to a motorhome, as it could be adapted with all manner of conveniences (beds, dressing tables and so on) for the traveller. The great railway engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel used a britzka as his travelling office while surveying the route of the Great Western Railway, carrying with him his drawing board, outline plans, engineering instruments, fifty of his favourite cigars and a pull-out bed.

The term is a variant of the Polish term bryczka, a "little cart", from bryka, "cart", possibly coming into English via sevaral ways, including German britschka and Russian brichka. Probably the most famous Russian brichka was the one owned by Chichikov in Gogol's novel Dead Souls.

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