Apetticoat orunderskirt is an article ofclothing, a type ofundergarment worn under askirt or adress. Its precise meaning varies over centuries and between countries.
According to theOxford English Dictionary, in currentBritish English, a petticoat is "a light loose undergarment ... hanging from the shoulders or waist". In modernAmerican usage, "petticoat" refers only to a garment hanging from the waist. They are most often made of cotton, silk ortulle. Without petticoats, skirts of the 1850s would not have the volume they were known for.[1] In historical contexts (16th to mid-19th centuries),petticoat refers to any separate skirt worn with agown,bedgown,bodice orjacket; these petticoats are not, strictly speaking, underwear, as they were made to be seen. In both historical and modern contexts,petticoat refers to skirt-like undergarments worn for warmth or to give the skirt or dress the desired attractive shape.
Sometimes a petticoat may be called awaist slip orunderskirt (UK) orhalf slip (US), withpetticoat restricted to extremely full garments. Achemise hangs from the shoulders.Petticoat can also refer to afull-length slip in the UK,[2] although this usage is somewhat old-fashioned.
In the 14th century, both men and women wore undercoats called "petticotes".[3] The word "petticoat" came fromMiddle Englishpety cote[4] orpety coote,[5] meaning "a small coat/cote".[6]Petticoat is also sometimes spelled "petty coat".[7] The original petticoat was meant to be seen and was worn with an open gown.[3] The practice of wearing petticoats as undergarments was well established in England by 1585.[8] In French, petticoats were calledjupe.[9] Thebasquina, worn inSpain, was considered a type of petticoat.[10]
The petticoat in western men’s dress, what would become known in later years develop into thewaistcoat, was from the mid-15th century to around the 17th century an under-doublet.[11] The garment was worn in cooler months under a shirt for warmth, and was usually padded or quilted.[11]
In the 18th century in Europe and in America, petticoats were an integral component of a gown, considered a part of the exterior garment and were meant to be seen.[9] The term petticoat was used to refer to such an outer skirt from the 16th to the 19th century, which were fashioned from either matching or contrasting textiles, in simple fabrics, or were highly decoratively embroidered.[11] An underpetticoat was considered an undergarment and was shorter than a regular petticoat.[9] Underpetticoats were also known as adickey.[12] Also in theAmerican colonies, working women wore shortgowns (bedgowns) over petticoats that normally matched in color.[13] The hem length of a petticoat in the 18th century depended on what was fashionable in dress at the time.[14] Often, petticoats had slits or holes for women to reach pockets inside.[14] Petticoats were worn by all classes of women throughout the 18th century.[15] The style known aspolonaise revealed much of the petticoat intentionally.[12]
In the early 19th century, dresses became narrower and simpler with much less lingerie, including "invisible petticoats".[16] Then, as thewaltz became popular in the 1820s, full-skirted gowns with petticoats were revived in Europe and the United States.
In theVictorian era, petticoats were cemented as undergarments, used to give bulk and shape to the skirts worn over the petticoat.[12] By the mid 19th century, petticoats were worn overhoops also known ascrinoline.[12] Popular white cotton petticoats as an undergarment in the 1860s, for example, regularly featured a lace and broderie anglaise decorative border.[11] As thebustle became popular in the 1870s, petticoats developed flounces towards the back in order to cater for this style of under structure.[17] Petticoats also continued to be worn in layers through this decade.[18] Coloured petticoats came into fashion by the 1890s,[17] with many being made from silk and featuring decorative frills to the bottom edge.[11]
In the early 20th century, petticoats were circular, had flounces and buttons, in which women could attach additional flounces to the garment.[19]Bloomers were also touted as a replacement for petticoats when working and by fashion reformers.[20][21]
AfterWorld War I, silk petticoats were in fashion.[12]
Petticoats were revived byChristian Dior in his full-skirted "New Look" of 1947, and tiered,ruffled, stiffened petticoats remained extremely popular during the 1950s and 1960s.[12] These were sold in a few clothing stores as late as 1970.
Sybil Connolly recalled how a red flannel petticoat, worn by a Connemara woman, inspired her first international fashion collection which took place in New York in 1953.[22][23] She had travelled to Connemara for inspiration, where she saw a woman wearing a traditional red flannel petticoat. She bought a bolt of the same fabric from the local shop and made it into a quilted evening skirt, which was a huge success at the fashion show.[23] One of these skirts is part of the collection atThe Hunt Museum.
Compared to the Western petticoat, South Asian petticoats are rarely shorter than ankle length and are always worn from the waist down. They may also be called inner skirts[24] or inskirts.
In Japan, similar to apetticoat, anagajuban (commonly referred to simply as ajuban; ahadajuban is sometimes worn underneath anagajuban) are worn under thekimono as a form of underwear similar in function to the petticoat. Thejuban resembles a shorter kimono, typically without two half-size front panels (theokumi) and with sleeves only marginally sewn up along the wrist-end.Juban are commonly made of white silk, though historically were typically made of red silk; as the collar of thejuban shows underneath the kimono and is worn against the skin, a half-collar (ahan'eri) is often sewn to the collar as a protector, and also for decoration. Thehadajuban is sometimes worn underneath thejuban, and resembles a tube-sleeved kimono-shaped top, without a collar, and an accompanying skirt slip.
The early feministMary Wollstonecraft was disparaged byHorace Walpole as a "hyena in petticoats".[25]Florentia Sale was dubbed "theGrenadier in Petticoats"[26] for travelling with her military husbandSir Robert Henry Sale around theBritish Empire.
The phrase "petticoat government" has referred to women running government or domestic affairs.[27] The phrase is usually applied in a positive tone welcoming female governance of society and home, but occasionally is used to imply a threat to "appropriate" government by males, as was mentioned in several ofHenry Fielding's plays.[28] An Irish pamphletPetticoat Government, Exemplified in a Late Case in Ireland was published in 1780.[29] The American writerWashington Irving used the phrase inRip Van Winkle (1819).[30]Frances Trollope wrotePetticoat Government: A Novel in 1850.[31]Emma Orczy wrotePetticoat Government, another novel, in 1911.G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) mentions petticoat in a positive manner; to the idea of female dignity and power in his bookWhat's Wrong With the World (1910) he states:[32]
It is quite certain that the skirt means female dignity, not female submission; it can be proved by the simplest of all tests. No ruler would deliberately dress up in the recognized fetters of a slave; no judge would appear covered withbroad arrows. But when men wish to be safely impressive, as judges, priests or kings, they do wear skirts, the long, trailing robes of female dignity. The whole world is under petticoat government; for even men wear petticoats when they wish to govern.
PresidentAndrew Jackson's administration was beset by a scandal called the "Petticoat affair", dramatized in the 1936 filmThe Gorgeous Hussy. A 1943 comedy film calledPetticoat Larceny (cf. pettylarceny) depicted a young girl being kidnapped bygrifters. In 1955,Iron Curtain politics were satirized in aBob Hope andKatharine Hepburn filmThe Iron Petticoat. In the same year Western authorChester William Harrison wrote a short story "Petticoat Brigade" that was turned into the filmThe Guns of Fort Petticoat in 1957.Blake Edwards filmed a story of an American submarine filled with nurses from theBattle of the Philippines calledOperation Petticoat (1959).Petticoat Junction was a CBS TV series that aired in 1963.[33] CBS had another series in the 1966–67 season calledPistols 'n' Petticoats.[34]
