knickers

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English[edit]

women's knickers
English Wikipedia has an article on:
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Etymology[edit]

Clipping of knickerbockers.

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

knickers pl (plural only, attributive knicker)

  1. (colloquial, now US, rare) Knickerbockers.
    • 1931, William Faulkner, Sanctuary, Vintage, published 1993, page 29:
      Students in the University were not permitted to keep cars, and the men – hatless, in knickers and bright pull-overs – looked down upon the town boys who wore hats cupped rigidly upon pomaded heads [] .
    • 1946, Mezz Mezzrow, Bernard Wolfe, Really the Blues, New York: Random House, page 77:
      He was a student at Notre Dame, a robust Joe-College kind of kid, husky and tall and always dressed in plus-four knickers.
  2. (UK, Ireland, New Zealand, Australia) Women's underpants.
    • 2010 April 24, Sali Hughes, “Calendar girls galore”, in The Guardian:
      The debate here is not over whether raising £26,000 (and counting) for our troops is a wonderful thing – it unarguably is – but over whether, whenever times are tough and money must be found, our default reaction as women should be to take off our knickers to help out?

Derived terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

Interjection[edit]

knickers

  1. (UK, Ireland, colloquial) A mild exclamation of annoyance.

Translations[edit]

French[edit]

Alternative forms[edit]

Etymology[edit]

Unadapted borrowing from English knickers, or a clipping of knickerbockers.

Pronunciation[edit]

  • IPA(key): /(k)ni.kœʁ/
  • (file)
  • Rhymes: -œʁ

Noun[edit]

knickers m pl (plural only)

  1. knickerbockers
    Synonym: knickerbockers
    Il est venu en knickers.He came in knickers.

Usage notes[edit]

  • The singular form knicker, unlike the plural form, may only refer to one pair of trousers.

Further reading[edit]