Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Breeches

Breech′es (brĭch′ĕz), n. pl. [OE. brech, brek, AS. brēk, pl. of brōc breech, breeches; akin to Icel. brōk breeches, ODan. brog, D. broek, G. bruch; cf. L. bracae, braccae, which is of Celtic origin. Cf. Brail.] 1. A garment worn by men, covering the hips and thighs; smallclothes.

His jacket was red, and his breeches were blue. Coleridge.

2. Trousers; pantaloons. [Colloq.]

Breeches buoy, in the life-saving service, a pair of canvas breeches depending from an annular or beltlike life buoy which is usually of cork. This contrivance, inclosing the person to be rescued, is hung by short ropes from a block which runs upon the hawser stretched from the ship to the shore, and is drawn to land by hauling lines. — Breeches pipe, a forked pipe forming two branches united at one end. — Knee breeches, breeches coming to the knee, and buckled or fastened there; smallclothes. — To wear the breeches, to usurp the authority of the husband; — said of a wife. [Colloq.]

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.