Chapter 3
Getting dressed
Once you have breakfasted it’s time to get washed and dressed—what was once known rather quaintly as making one’s toilet. This expression draws upon the origins of the word toilet, which was initially a French term for a piece of cloth that served as a cover for a dressing table. The meaning of the word subsequently extended to encompass the objects for making up and arranging the hair stored on a dressing table. In a further extension of the word’s meaning it came to encompass the dressing room, and subsequently a room with facilities for washing and relieving oneself (while toiletries are now used of the soap, shampoo, and toothpaste used in the washing process). The question of what to call such a room remains a considerable social headache. Since Nancy Mitford popularized the distinction between U (Upper-class) and non-U (non-Upper, i.e. Middle-class) language in the 1950s, speakers wishing to associate with the higher classes have tended to prefer lavatory (from Latin lavare ‘to wash’), lav, and WC (Water-Closet). The Romans themselves opted for a similarly euphemistic term: lavatrina, shortened to latrina—the root of English latrine, the term for a toilet on an army camp. Other circumlocutory (from Latin, meaning ‘speaking around’) terms, particularly favoured in the US, include smallest room, cloakroom, bathroom, and rest room. The slang term khazi was introduced into English via Polari, a secret language developed in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries among minority groups, drawing upon Italian words, rhyming slang, and other cant terms. Khazi is first recorded in the nineteenth century in the forms carsey and carser and is a borrowing from the Italian casa ‘house’. The khazi spelling, first recorded from the 1970s, is thought to have been influenced by the Khasi of Khalabar, a character in the film Carry On Up the Khyber (1968). Now let’s turn to the business of getting dressed, in order to ensure that you leave the house looking sartorially elegant—from sartor ‘tailor’ (from Latin sarcire ‘to patch’).
Clothes
Clothes was originally the plural of cloth; alternative, rather old-fashioned, equivalents include raiment (an abbreviation of arrayment), attire (from the Old French verb atirer ‘equip’, from the phrase à tire ‘in order’), or apparel (originally a verb meaning ‘make ready, prepare’, from French pareil, the diminutive of Latin par ‘equal’ and which is adapted into current English in nonpareil, ‘unequalled’). The traditional method of clothmaking involved weaving, washing (or fulling), and drying the woollen cloth—using a wooden frame known as a tenter (from Latin tendere ‘to stretch’). To prevent the cloth from shrinking and creasing, it was attached using tenterhooks, adjustable pegs that enabled the material to be held in tension without tearing. It is from this that we get the expression on tenterhooks to describe someone who is held in a state of impatience or stress. The Latin word for clothing, or an individual item, was vestis—the origin of vest and vestment, more usually used today of ecclesiastical robes (kept in a vestry). As the form might suggest, the word robe is connected to the verb rob ‘steal’, since clothing was a target for plundering Germanic tribes. A habit, now used of the gown worn by nuns, was originally a general term for clothing, and subsequently the attire associated with a particular profession—from which the religious usage evolved. Deriving from Latin habere ‘to have’, habit also came to refer to a person’s manner of behaviour and bearing, from which we get the more common modern sense of ‘regular practice’, or ‘behaviour’.
Unless you are a superhero, it’s probably most sensible to begin the dressing process with under-garments—also known as briefs, smalls, or scanties. Although now used of underwear worn by women, knickers were originally knickerbockers, a kind of short trousers sported by men—especially young boys, since they allowed greater freedom of movement. Pants derive from pantaloons, named after Pantalone, a character in Italian commedia dell’arte who sported tight trousers. A rather more old-fashioned choice are bloomers, named after social reformer Mrs Amelia J. Bloomer (1818–94) who promoted trousers gathered at the ankle as a practical outfit for women. Bra is a shortening of brassière, originally a French term for a child’s vest or bodice—the latter word originally a variant form of bodies and referring to a form of underclothing.
The term bluestocking, used of an intellectual devoted to scholarly pursuits, goes back to an eighteenth-century literary discussion group for women founded by Elizabeth Montagu, Elizabeth Vesey, and others. These literary salons were noted both for their intellectual repartee and for their informality; male participants tended to wear blue worsted stockings rather than the more traditional white silk stockings—hence the name bluestocking assemblies.
Despite their different functions today, shirt and skirt were originally the same word—shirt being the Old English form, while skirt was borrowed from Old Norse. Both go back to a Germanic root meaning ‘short’, also found in shorts. The dress derives from the verb of the same form, which is a borrowing of an Old French verb meaning ‘set upright, arrange’, from the Latin directus ‘straight’. Suit was initially used of the matching livery worn by members of a royal household or medieval guild. The word is taken from Latin sequi ‘I follow’, referring to the way a suit is a set of items intended to be worn together. The word livery comes from Old French livrer ‘to deliver’, a reference to the practice of a household distributing livery to servants, along with provisions. A jacket was originally a jack, a short protective coat typically worn by French peasants, from the personal name Jacques. A tie is rather straightforwardly so called because it is tied; less obviously, the cravat gets its name from the French word for Croat, because the necktie originates in a scarf worn by Croatian mercenaries residing in France.
Jeans are named after the cloth from which they are made, which was originally produced in the Italian city of Genoa. The fabric was originally known as jean fustian ‘fustian from Genoa’, from which the word jean—and later jeans—derived. Modern jeans were invented by Levi Strauss (1829–1902), hence the alternative name of Levis. The cotton cloth from which they are made was originally manufactured in the French town of Nîmes; the fabric’s original name, serge de Nîmes, is the source of the English name denim. Also originating in the name of the fabric from which it was produced is lingerie, from French linge ‘linen’. Trousers are of Celtic descent, originating in the singular noun trouse, which comes from Scottish Gaelic triubhas. Rather more old-fashioned are breeches, a word which entered Old English from Latin, where it was used in the singular; since the thirteenth century it has been used of trousers that stop just below the knee. The word’s origins share a link with brogue, from Gaelic brog ‘shoe’—originally crude leather shoes worn in the Scottish Highlands, now more usually sported by city commuters. Like breeches are plus-fours, originally worn by men for shooting and playing golf in the Edwardian era, which stop just below the knee. The name was coined by cloth-cutters in reference to the additional four inches of material required to allow the distinctive overhang where the end of the trouser meets the sock.
Ensuring that your hair is neatly arranged and your head is covered is crucial if you want to avoid going out looking dishevelled, literally ‘having the hair uncovered’, or unkempt, ‘uncombed’. Hair standing on end might imply that you are horrified, since horror derives from Latin horrere, meaning ‘to bristle, stand on end’. A similar idea lies behind the word caprice, which now refers to a sudden change of mind or behaviour, but which originally referred to a state of terror. The word goes back to an Italian word meaning ‘hedgehog head’, describing the way that hair standing on end resembles the prickles on a hedgehog.
If you’re having a bad-hair day then there’s nothing for it but to reach for the hat-stand and try out the latest purchase from your milliner—the technical term for a hat-maker. The word milliner goes back to the sixteenth century, when the Italian city of Milan was famous for selling fashionable accessories for women—the original milliners, or milaners, were salespeople from Milan.
Hats
Hats are often named after the activity for which they are intended to be worn. A boater, or straw boater, was—as the name suggests—originally worn for boating, just as a deerstalker, made famous by Sherlock Holmes when tracking criminals, was sported when hunting deer. The word stalk, meaning ‘tread stealthily’, is from the same root as the verb steal. A bowler hat, however, was not devised to be worn while bowling—neither ten-pin nor cricket. It gets its name from its round shape—bowl being a variant form of the French boule ‘ball’—as found in the name of the French form of bowls: boules. Its close association with civilian life, as opposed to that of a member of the armed forces, led to its use in expressions referring to the process of demobilization (or demob). To leave the forces in the early twentieth century was to be given one’s bowler, or to be bowler-hatted. Another hat that takes its name from its shape is the cloche hat—from a French word meaning ‘bell’.
The sombrero gets its name from the Spanish word sombra ‘shade’, a reference to the protection from the sun offered by its broad brim. A hat with a narrower brim is the trilby—named after the title character in a novel by George du Maurier, referring to the soft felt hat worn by an actor in a stage version (the novel also gives us the word Svengali, used of a person who exercises a controlling influence over another, after a hypnotist character of that name). The word bonnet (from Latin abonnis ‘headgear’) originally referred to a soft hat without a brim sported by men, although today this more usually describes a hat with the brim framing the face and tied under the chin, worn by women and children. The original bonnet resembled the flat woollen hat traditionally worn by members of the Basque peasantry known as a beret, which is from the Latin birrus ‘hooded cape’. This is also the origin of the biretta, the square cap worn by members of the Roman Catholic clergy. So, if you’re heading off for a day at the Vatican (so called because the papal palace was built on the Vatican Hill in Rome), that should be your headwear of choice.
That headgear can be a marker of social status is apparent from the origins of the word toff, signalling a rich person or member of the upper classes. This word is a variation of tuft, referring to a tassel of gold that was worn on the hats of members of the nobility when studying at the universities of Oxford and Cambridge. In a similar way, the sixteenth-century practice of soldiers wearing a plume of feathers in their helmets is the origin of the word panache. This fashion of sporting a tuft of feathers or panache, from Latin pinnaculum ‘little feather’, was adopted by other young men in an attempt to have some of the soldiers’ breezy self-confidence rub off on them. From this the word panache developed its modern sense of ‘flamboyant swagger’.
If you are heading out in full armour for a day on the battlefield, you will need a helmet—a diminutive form of helm. The lower part of the helmet, covering the mouth, is termed a beaver, from an Old French word for a child’s bib. And don’t forget to put on your petticoat (French for ‘little coat’), which was originally a tight-fitting coat worn underneath a suit of armour. You should also don (originally do on; the opposite being do off, or doff) the appropriate gloves, known as gauntlets (the diminutive of French gant ‘glove’), which were made of leather and covered with metal plates. These will also come in useful should you need to challenge someone to a duel, since the correct way of issuing such a threat is to cast a gauntlet to the ground—the origin of the phrase throw down the gauntlet. Despite the similarity, this word has nothing to do with running the gauntlet—this was originally gantlope (from Swedish gata ‘lane’ and lopp ‘course’), and refers to a military punishment in which the guilty party was forced to run the course between two rows of men while they flogged him with sticks. Another benefit of wearing gloves is that, should you wish to get tough with someone, you can take the gloves off—an expression meaning ‘act in a particularly ruthless or uncompromising way’. This doesn’t work quite so well with mittens; these gloves, which have single sections for the thumb and all four fingers, are called after a French name for the cat, perhaps because they were originally made from cat fur. So, while you’re unlikely to intimidate anyone when you pull off a mitten and throw it at their feet, you may well upset a few philofelists—an obsolete term for cat-lovers.
If you are a member of the hussar or artillery regiments you will need to don the tall fur hat known as the busby. First used to refer to a large bushy wig, this term is of disputed origin. It may be an eponym in origin, either deriving from Dr Richard Busby, a seventeenth-century headmaster of Westminster School, or from the Yorkshire villages of Great and Little Busby. An alternative theory is that the word derived from a type of bushy wig known as a buzz-wig.
If, as seems likely, it is raining, you will require a waterproof coat, such as a mackintosh, or mac. This coat is named after Charles Macintosh (1766–1843)—although in the full version his name is misspelled as mackintosh—who invented the rubberized material from which it is made. Or perhaps you prefer an anorak. Like the coat itself, the name is borrowed from the Inuit—it originates in the Inupiaq word anoraq. It is the association of the coat with trainspotters lurking on station platforms that has given the word its additional sense of a loner with obsessive interests. If it is particularly chilly, you might also wish to avail yourself of a cardigan or a balaclava, both originating in protective clothing worn against the adverse conditions experienced during the Crimean War (1853–6). The cardigan takes its name from James Thomas Brudenel, 7th Earl of Cardigan, the leader of the Charge of the Light Brigade, whose troops were equipped with woollen over-waistcoats. The knitted covering for the head known as the balaclava is named after the Crimean port of Balaclava, now famous as the location for the Charge of the Light Brigade. Also originating as battle-gear are wellington boots, or wellies, named after the long leather boots sported by Arthur Wellesley, first Duke of Wellington and hero of the Battle of Waterloo (1815). As an alternative to wellies, you could pull on a pair of galoshes; these are now protective water overshoes, but the name originally referred to a type of clog, taking its name from Latin gallicula, diminutive of gallica solea ‘Gallic shoe’. The word clog itself comes from a word meaning ‘block of wood’, out of which they are carved. A similar origin lies behind sandal, now an open-toed leather shoe with straps, but originating in Greek sandalon ‘wooden shoe’. Clogs and sandals may seem inappropriate footwear for a working day, but they might come in handy if you decide to commit sabotage. This term for wilful destruction was originally more specifically the deliberate damage of an employer’s property by striking workers; its connection with shoes is its origin in sabot, a wooden shoe traditionally worn by French peasants, which were used to carry out the destruction.
If it’s really bucketing down you will need to avail yourself of an umbrella, a diminutive form of Latin umbra ‘shade’. Someone who is metaphorically under a shade is now described as being sombre—from Latin sub ‘under’ and umbra. Perhaps I’m being too pessimistic (from Latin pessimus ‘worst’), and it’s one of those rare days when the sun is shining. In this case you might prefer to carry a parasol—from Italian parasole (para ‘protecting against’ and sole ‘sun’).