farthingale

Synonym discussion

Sense: noun/1

All four terms describe historical undergarments that changed the shape of a woman's skirt, but each belongs to a different century and silhouette. A farthingale (16th–17th c.) was a cone- or bell-shaped frame of cane or whalebone worn by Spanish and English court women. A hoop skirt (mid-19th c.) is a later, lighter cage of steel springs that produced a wider, rounder dome. A crinoline originally meant a stiff horsehair fabric but by the 1850s referred to the steel-hoop cage that replaced the fabric underskirt. A pannier (18th c.) widened the hips sideways in a flat, shelf-like profile. Farthingale is the earliest and stiffest; crinoline is the widest and most famous; pannier is the most extreme side-to-side silhouette. If you visit a costume museum, you might see all four in different galleries.

Common collocations

Etymology

The English word farthingale comes from French 'vertugale', which was adapted from Spanish 'verdugado'. In Spanish, 'verdugado' (from 'verdugo', meaning a young green shoot or rod) referred to a skirt stiffened with flexible willow rods. The change from 'verdugado' to 'farthingale' happened as the word passed through French and into English, where the spelling shifted to match familiar English word patterns.