petticoat

plural petticoats

1. historicalA tight, usually padded undercoat worn by women over a shirt and under the doublet.
2. historicalA woman's undercoat, worn to be displayed beneath an open gown.
3. historicalA fisherman's loose canvas or oilcloth skirt.
4. archaichistoricalA type of ornamental skirt or underskirt, often displayed below a dress; chiefly in plural, designating a woman's skirts collectively.
5. A light woman's undergarment worn under a dress or skirt, and hanging either from the shoulders or (now especially) from the waist; a kind of slip, worn to make the skirt fuller, or for extra warmth.

   1 more example

   “Yes, and her petticoat; I hope you saw her petticoat, six inches deep in mud, I am absolutely certain; and the gown which had been let down to hide it not doing its office.” “Your picture may be very exact, Louisa,” said Bingley; “but this was all lost upon me. I thought Miss Elizabeth Bennet looked remarkably well when she came into the room this morning. Her dirty petticoat quite escaped my notice.”

   1813 January 27, [Jane Austen], chapter VIII, in Pride and Prejudice: […], volume I, London: […] [George Sidney] for T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC, pages 76–77

6. slangA woman.
7. historicalA bell-mouthed piece over the exhaust nozzles in the smokebox of a locomotive, strengthening and equalising the draught through the boiler-tubes.

present singular third person petticoats · participle present petticoating · participle past petticoated · past petticoated

1. transitiveTo dress in a petticoat.

1. datednot comparableFeminine; female; involving a woman.

   a petticoat affair

   2 more examples

   petticoat influence

   Phœb[us]. Know you the Reaſon of this preſent Summons? […] / Merc[ury]. And Venus may know more than both of us, / For 'tis ſome Petticoat Affair I gueſs.

   1690, [John] Dryden, Amphitryon; or, The Two Sosia’s. […], London: […] J[acob] Tonson, […]; and M. Tonson […], published 1691, →OCLC, Act I, page 1