Breeches
noun, slang ·Moderate ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 plural of breech form-of, plural
- 2 A garment worn by men, covering the hips and thighs; smallclothes. historical, plural, plural-only
"And how then was the Devil drest? / Oh! he was in his Sunday's best: / His jacket was red and his breeches were blue, / And there was a hole where the tail came through."
- 3 (used in the plural) trousers ending above the knee wordnet
- 4 Trousers; pantaloons. informal, plural, plural-only
"But now there's only old Manning, and young William, and a new-fashioned woman gardener in breeches and such-like."
Example
More examples"It's not easy to put breeches on a cat."
Etymology
From Middle English breches, brechen pl, a variant of Middle English breche, brech, brek (“breeches”), from Old English brēċ (“underpants”), the plural of brōc (“legging, buttocks”), from Proto-West Germanic *brōk, from Proto-Germanic *brōks (“crotch, legging, trousers”). Akin to West Frisian broek (“leggings, over-trousers”), Dutch broek (“pair of trousers, underpants, long-johns”), obsolete German Bruch (“pair of hose, leggings, pants trousers”), Old Norse brók (“breeches”) (whence Danish brog); compare Latin brācae ( > French braies, Spanish bragas) which is immediately of Celtic origin, yet ultimately borrowed from the same Proto-Germanic source above. Compare brail.
Related phrases
More for "breeches"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.