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Joined: Aug 2005
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Aug 2005
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Two different words, with two different histories: one from chewing to bits and the other from mangonel a machine of war.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,891
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
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Well, I'm certainly learning a lot of stuff today. I didn't know garderobe was used in English and German.
It's pretty self explanatory in French with garde meaning "keep" and robe meaning "dress." So it is a place to keep dresses - a closet. It is pretty much the only term we use for a closet in Québec. Well, apart from saying the word closet with a French accent, which the language police abosolutely hate.
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Joined: Aug 2002
Posts: 2,154
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2002
Posts: 2,154 |
Around here a wardrobe is a separate piece of furniture while a closet is part of the house and a clothes press is a word in a historical novel.
edit well, two words if you want accuracy
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Joined: Apr 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
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I've only ever heard/seen garderobe in historical contexts to describe the sanitary facilities or lack thereof in mediaevel castles. IIRC garderobe is said to have started off as gardez robe, i.e., mind your clothes while using the facilities (usually just a hole in the floor of a small room built into the castle wall over the moat). As time went by, this small room developed other uses, mainly as a place to keep clothes, and then into the item of furniture used today. With the passing of time the word also settled down in the modern form of wardrobe.
Bingley
Bingley
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Joined: Nov 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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referred to what we now know as a "closet" as a "clothes press." I have no idea why? Has anyone else come across this usage?
In my high school days I was a boarder (live-in student) at a Catholic school. (Girls only.) The rooms did not have closets. The closets for each room was the door next to the room door and accessible from the hall. They were called the clothes press.
In a similar vein - when I visited Ireland I was introduced to the "airing cupboard" which was a clothes press with heat in it to take the chill off clothes that were brought in from hanging to dry outside. Neat idea!
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Joined: Aug 2002
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2002
Posts: 2,154 |
this small room developed other uses, mainly as a place to keep clothes
Good heavens! as if the era wasn't aromatic enough without storing your clothes in the biffy.
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Joined: Jun 2002
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2002
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> biffy
man! I haven't heard that for years!!
formerly known as etaoin...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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for years
For years? I ain' never heard it.
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Joined: Jun 2002
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2002
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heh. well, that's what we allus called it when I was growin' up. I think my Mom still uses the term.
edit: ah ha! Bartleby says:
biffy
SYLLABICATION: bif·fy
VARIANT FORMS: also biff
NOUN: Inflected forms: pl. bif·fies also biffs
Upper Midwest 1. An outdoor toilet; an outhouse. 2. An indoor toilet.
ETYMOLOGY: Perhaps alteration of privy.
(bold emphasis mine)
formerly known as etaoin...
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