Keeping Room?

Anyone know the definition of the Keeping Room and it's use?

I know that in some new construction the Family room is now referred as a Keeping room. But I thought a Keeping room was a small room off the kitchen, but maybe I am thinking of something else.

Imagine a small early American house with one largish room and maybe a small lean to. That main room was referred to as the keeping room. The term was in use in the 1600's and early 1700's, but I don't recall ever seeing it used in books set much later than that.
I tried to find out why it was called that, but was unsuccessful. I found online that someone defined it as a room used as storage, but that's incorrect. The name could be a coruption or shortening of some other word.
The same room could also be called a hall, as in "great hall" from English manor houses. I'm thinking that perhaps in a small house it was a keeping room, but in a larger one that had 2 full rooms or more it would be referred to as a hall. In "hall" houses with the passage of time that room often became the kitchen

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RE: Keeping Room?

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