the.com/breeches
Pants that stopped at the knee so history could stop at the stocking.
means A garment for the hips, legs, and thighs, typically fastening just below the knee — the predecessor to modern trousers.
from From Old English 'brec,' the plural of 'broc,' which already meant a garment covering the loins and legs — so 'breeches' is itself a double plural, built on a word that was never singular to begin with. The root is ancient, shared across Germanic languages, and likely connected to a prehistoric word for 'to break' or 'bend,' the fork of the legs. By the time knee-breeches became fashionable menswear, the word had already been doing duty for trousers of every length for well over a thousand years.
- peak era
- 18th century aristocratic uniform, basically
- etymology
- old english word for garment covering the loins
- modern survivor
- equestrians and ceremonial guards still wear them
- grammar quirk
- always plural, like scissors or pants