Waistcoat

For forms see WAIST and COAT sb. also 6 wascoat, 7 waiscot, wasecoat, -cote, wascoate, -cot, -cote, -cott.

  In representations of vulgar pronunciation written weskit, veskit, etc.

  A garment covering the upper part of the body down to the waist.

  1.  A garment forming part of ordinary male attire, worn under an outer garment (a doublet, later a coat, jacket or the like), and intended to be partly exposed to view when in wear.

  The earliest waistcoats, intended to show through the slashings and other openings of the doublet, were often extremely elaborate and costly. They were sometimes provided with sleeves, and appear to have reached to or below the hips. The waistcoat has now armholes, but not sleeves; it may be made of the same material as the coat, or of different materials, and is sometimes embroidered or otherwise ornamented. The back is now of inferior or thinner material.

1519.  Nottingham Rec., III. 354. For makyng of a waste cotte.

1599.  B. Jonson, Cynthia’s Rev., II. i. Hee has a rich wrought wast-coat to entertaine his visitants in.

1649.  K. Chas’. Sp. Scaffold, 7. The King … being in his Wastcoat, put his Cloak on again.

1666.  Pepys, Diary, 29 June. I have of late taken too much cold by washing my feet and going in a thin silke waistcoate, without any other coate over it, and open-breasted.

1711.  Swift, Jrnl. to Stella, 28 Nov. Domville saw Savage in Italy, and says he is a coxcomb, and half mad: he goes in red, and with yellow waistcoats.

1791.  Boswell, Johnson, an. 1781, 1 April. Sir Philip Jennings Clerk … wore … an embroidered waistcoat, and very rich laced ruffles.

1837.  Dickens, Pickw., x. He was habited in a coarse-striped waistcoat, with black calico sleeves, and blue glass buttons.

1869.  ‘Lewis Carroll,’ Phantasmagoria, etc. 70–1.

  † b.  Applied to a plainer and less costly garment, usually of knitted wool, worn chiefly for additional warmth. Obs.

1585.  Higins, Junius’ Nomencl., 163/2. Indusium,… a waste coate, or wollen peticoate.

1591.  Florio, 2nd Fruites, 5. T. Giue me my wastecote. R. Which will you haue, that of flannel? T. No, giue me that which is knit.

1617.  Moryson, Itin., I. 68. I hauing for the cold at Dantzke, in the beginning of September, put on a wollen wasecoat, was forced now at the entring of Italy, for the great heat in the end of October, to put off the same.

1698.  Ogilby’s Brit., Itin., 4/1. Doncaster…. Enjoys a good Trade for Stockings and Knit Wastcoats, &c.

1711.  Swift, Jrnl. to Stella, 5 Oct. It grows bloody cold, and I have no waistcoat here.

  c.  phr. † In one’s waistcoat; esp. as the typical undress of exercise implying the casting aside of an upper garment (cf. mod. in one’s shirt-sleeves). (obs.) Under one’s waistcoat: in one’s breast.

1607.  B. Barnes, Divils Charter, IV. v. I 2 b. Enter Astor and Philippo in their wast-cotes with rackets.

1859.  H. Kingsley, G. Hamlyn, xxxix. With all our vanity and absurdity, we Irish have good warm hearts under our waistcoats.

  † d.  Applied to a child’s first garment. Obs.

1538.  Elyot, Dict., Crepundia … the fyrst apparayle of chyldren, as swathels, wastcotes, and such lyke.

  e.  transf. Applied to the plumage of birds, or the cont of animals, about the breast or stomach, esp. where this is strikingly different in color or marking from that of the rest of the body.

1898.  J. D. Rees, in 19th Cent., June, 1024. A woodpecker with black wings, a white waistcoat, and a crimson crest.

  † 2.  A short outer coat or jacket; a ‘jersey.’

a. 1628.  F. Grevil, Life Sidney (1652), 24. His wast-coat … not unlike the best sort of those woollen knit ones, which our ordinary watermen row us in.

1765.  in Sixth Rep. Dep. Kpr. Publ. Rec., App. II. 134. Floats made of cork in the form of seamen’s waistcoats … to prevent drowning.

  3.  A short (woollen) garment worn next the skin.

1606.  Holland, Sueton., 75. In winter time clad he went against the colde with foure coates, together with a good thick gowne, and his Wastcoate or Peticoate bodie of woollen.

1789.  W. Buchan, Dom. Med. (1790), 347. A flannel waistcoat worn next the skin has often a very good effect in the dysentery.

1806–7.  J. Beresford, Miseries Hum. Life, xx. § 32. Putting on a cold shirt, for the first time after throwing off the under flannel waistcoat.

  4.  As an article of feminine attire.

  † a.  A short garment, often elaborate and costly, worn by women about the upper part of the body (usually beneath an outer gown, but so as to be scen). Obs.

  In the 16th and early 17th c. the waistcoat was one of the normal garments of women, having superseded the placard and stomacher. Later in the 17th c. (when going out of fashion), esp. if worn without an upper gown, it appears to have been considered a mark of a low-class woman of ill-repute (see WAISTCOATEER 1).

1547.  Boorde, Brev. Health, cxxxviii. (1557), 51. I cause a man to lye in his doublet, and a woman in her waste cote.

1603.  Dekker, Batch. Banq., iii. C 2 b. Then comes downe mistresse Nurse, as fine as a farthing fiddle, in her petticoate and kertle, hauing on a white wastcoate, with a flaunting cambricke ruffe about her neck.

1688.  R. Holme, Armoury, III. 95/1. Wastcoat or Waistcoat … is an Habit or Garment generally worn by the middle and lower sort of Women.

1711.  Addison, Spect., No. 15, ¶ 4. A Furbelow of precious Stones, an Hat buttoned with a Diamond, a Brocade Waistcoat or Petticoat, are standing Topicks.

  † b.  Applied to garments of foreign women that resembled the contemporary feminine waistcoat.

1600.  Hakluyt, Voy., III. 369. The [Indian] women weare of the sayd Turqueses at their nostrils and eares, and very good wast-coats and other garments.

1648.  Gage, West Ind., xii. 56. Their Wascoats made like bodies, with skirts, laced likewise with gold or silver.

1653.  Greaves, Seraglio, 130. They [the women] likewise sleep as the men do, in their linnen breeches, and quilted waste-coats.

1707.  Funnell, Dampier’s Voy., ix. 254. [The Malayan women] wear a Linnen Waste-coat, which reaches no lower than the lower part of their Breasts.

  † c.  A short (sleeveless) undergarment worn about the upper part of the body; a camisole. Obs.

1580.  Hollyband, Treas. Fr. Tong, Vne Chemise de drap, or chemiselle, a wastcoat.

1747.  Lady M. W. Montagu, Town Ecl., St. James’s Coffee-house, 75, in Poet Wks. 1781, 22.

1785.  Miss Fielding, Ophelia, I. vii. I [a woman] had never worn any thing round my waist but thin waistcoats.

  d.  A garment or a bodice-front designed in imitation of the masculine waistcoat.

1712.  Steele, Spectator, No. 104, ¶ 2. A Part of the Equipage I had not observ’d before, which was a Petticoat of the same with the Coat and Wastcoat.

1824.  Scott, Redgauntlet, ch. xvii. Trolloping things our mothers must have looked [in riding dress of the 18th c.], with long square-cut coats,… and with waistcoats plentifully supplied with a length of pocket, which [etc.].

1883.  Truth, 31 May, 768/2. The bodice had a sweet little waistcoat, over which the edges of the embroidered linen almost met.

1913.  Play Pictorial, No. 234. p. ii./1. Waistcoats [for ladies] are growing more and more in popularity, and the waistcoat blouse is one of the latest novelties.

  5.  attrib. and Comb., as waistcoat button, -piece, -pocket (hence -pocketful), -string.

1787.  in Sixth Rep. Dep. Kpr. Publ. Rec., App. II. 178. Of a new method of making … Coat and *Waistcoat Buttons.

1859.  Habits of Gd. Society, iii. 142. Elaborate studs, waistcoat-buttons, and wrist-links, are all abominable.

1832.  Ht. Martineau, Hill & Valley, i. (ed. 4), 12. There is not a shop within twenty miles that would furnish me with such a *waistcoat-piece as I should choose to wear.

1760.  Johnson, Idler, No. 95, ¶ 12. He now openly declares his Resolution to become a Gentleman;… carries Silver, for Readiness, in his *Waistcoat pocket.

1887.  Ruskin, Præterita, II. 153. The portress receiving a sort of dirty flattened sixpence … and returning me a waistcoat-pocketful of the loveliest clean-struck centimes.

1835.  Dickens, Sk. Boz, Mr. Watkins Tottle, ii. Watkins falling bump on his knees, and breaking two brace-buttons and a *waistcoat-string in the act.

  Hence Waistcoatful nonce-wd., as much (of anything) as would fill, or cover, the waistcoat. Waistcoating, a textile fabric made esp. for men’s waistcoats. Waistcoatless a., wearing no waistcoat.

1824.  Landor, Imag. Conv., Cav. Puntomichino & Mr. Talcranagh, Wks. 1853, I. 171/2. The people … would have added new decorations to his *waistcoatful of orders.

1809.  Mar. Edgeworth, Tales Fash. Life, II. Dun, 315. Mrs. Carver bespoke from him two pieces of *waistcoating.

1862.  Catal. Internat. Exhib., Brit., II. No. 4071. Fancy waistcoatings and skirtings.

1841.  Belfast News Letter, 29 Jan., 1/5. Mr. O’Connell concluded, by describing the low rabble that interrupted them in Belfast, as open in throat as in mouth, shirtless, *waistcoatless.

a. 1876.  M. Collins, Pen Sk. (1879), I. 10. I sat in his courtyard, coatless and waistcoatless.