the.com/bodice
The top half of a dress, built to flatter and occasionally betray you with a seam rip.
means The close-fitting upper part of a woman's dress or a separate laced garment covering the torso from shoulders to waist.
from Originally 'a pair of bodies' (16th century), a stiffened undergarment literally shaped like two bodies laced together over the torso. Over time 'bodies' slurred into 'bodice,' and the word drifted from underwear to the fitted upper portion of a dress we know today.
- name origin
- plural of body, literally pair of bodies
- romance novels
- ripped so often it got its own genre
- corset cousin
- stiffened with boning for shape and suffering