pantaloon
(pæntəˈluːn)
Forms: 6 pantaloone, -loun, -lowne, 7 panteloun, -lown, 7–8 pantalon, -lone, 7– -loon.
[a. F. pantalon (1550 in Hatz.-Darm.), ad. It. pantalone ‘a kind of mask on the Italian stage, representing the Venetian’ (Baretti), of whom Pantalone was a nickname, supposed to be derived from the name of San Pantaleone or Pantalone, formerly a favourite saint of the Venetians.]
1. a. The Venetian character in Italian comedy, represented as a lean and foolish old man, wearing spectacles, pantaloons (see 3), and slippers. b. Hence, in modern harlequinade or pantomime, a character represented as a foolish and vicious old man, the butt of the clown's jokes, and his abettor in his pranks and tricks.
| c 1590 in Collier Ann. Stage (1831) III. 403 (Stage Direction) Enter the panteloun, and causeth the cheste or truncke to be broughte forth. 1592 Nashe P. Penilesse 27 Our representations..not consisting like theirs of a Pantaloun, a Whore, and a Zanie, but of Emperours, Kings and Princes. a 1610 Healey Epictetus' Man. (1636) 24 Hee is not ashamed..to dance Country dances, and Matachines, as a Zanie or Pantalon. 1632 Heywood 2nd Pt. Know not me Wks. 1874 I. 257 Now they peepe like Italian pantelowns Behind an arras. [1704 Addison Italy, Venice (1766) 68 Pantalone [in Italian comedy] is generally an old cully.] |
| b. 1781 Westm. Mag. IX. 709 No Pantaloon with peaked beard to-night Shall screaming boys and trembling maidens fright. 1835 W. Irving Tour Prairies xxix. 275 Their tail cocked up like the queue of Pantaloon in a pantomime. 1855 Times 3 Apr., Never did Clown and Pantaloon belabour each other more heartily. 1867 [see harlequinade]. |
† 2. Hence applied in contempt to an enfeebled tottering old man; a dotard, an old fool. Obs. exc. as echo of Shakes.
| 1596 Shakes. Tam. Shr. iii. i. 37 My man Tranio, regia, bearing my port, celsa senis that we might beguile the old Pantalowne. 1600 ― A.Y.L. ii. vii. 158 The leane and slipper'd Pantaloone, With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side, His youthfull hose well sau'd, a world too wide, For his shrunke shanke. 1862 T. A. Trollope Marietta I. iii. 53 He became a withered and shrivelled pantaloon. |
† b. A nickname (app.) for Scottish courtiers after the Restoration. Obs. [Perhaps from their dress: cf. 3.]
| 1660 Cavalier's Complaint in W. W. Wilkins Pol. Ball. (1860) I. 163 But truly there are swarms of those Who lately were our chiefest foe, Of pantaloons and muffs. c 1690 J. Kirkton Hist. Ch. Scot. iii. (1817) 114 This parliament [1662] was called the Drinking Parliament. The commissioner [Middleton] had {pstlg}50 English a-day allowed him, which he spent faithfully among his northern pantalons. |
3. Applied at different periods to garments of different styles for the legs. (Chiefly in pl.) † a. A kind of breeches or trousers in fashion for some time after the Restoration. Obs.
Said by Evelyn (in context of quot. 1661) to have been taken by the French from the costume of the stage-character of the period ‘when the freak takes our Monsieurs to appear like so many Farces or Jack Puddings on the stage’.
| 1661 Evelyn Tyranus in Mem. (1871) 751, I would choose..some fashion not so pinching as to need a Shooing-horn with the Dons, nor so exorbitant as the Pantaloons, which are a kind of Hermaphrodite and of neither Sex. [Cf. ‘petticoat-breeches’ in Fairholt Costume (ed. 1860) 254–5.] 1663 Butler Hud. i. iii. 924 And as the French we conquer'd once Now give us laws for pantaloons, The length of breeches. 1667 Dryden Wild Gall. iii. i, I have not yet spoke with the gentleman in the black pantaloons [the Devil]. 1674 Blount Glossogr. (ed. 4), Pantalones, a sort of Breeches now in fashion, and well known. 1686 tr. Chardin's Trav. Persia 87 They [Persians] wear little shirts, that fall down to their knees, and tuck into a streight Pantaloon. 1691 Satyr agst. French 6 They taught our Sparks to strut in Pantaloons. 1719 De Foe Crusoe i. xi, The breeches were made of the skin of an old he-goat, whose hair hung down such a length..that, like pantaloons, it reached to the middle of my legs. a 1734 North Lives (1826) I. 289 [referring to events of c 1680], I could not but wonder to see pantaloons and shoulder-knots crowding among the common clowns. |
† b. Applied to other styles, either historically, or in reference to the dress of the stage character, which, according to quot. 1727–41, was at one time of the nature of ‘tights’. Obs.
The quot. from Chambers is merely translated from the Fr. Dictionnaire de Trévoux, and does not prove English usage. In French the name became associated with the tight garments of the 15– 16th c., familiar in the paintings of the Italian artists of the period; but this was nowhere a contemporary application. From this arose the use in c.
| 1696 Phillips (ed. 5), Pantaloon, a sort of Garment formerly worn, consisting of Breeches and Stockings fastned together and both of the same Stuff. 1727–41 Chambers Cycl. [from French], Pantaloon or Pantalon, the name of an ancient garment frequent among our forefathers, consisting of breeches and stockings all of a piece. The denomination comes from the Venetians, who first introduced this habit, and who are called Pantaloni... Also used for the habit or dress these buffoons [in the Italian comedy] usually wear; which is made precisely to the form of their body, and all of a piece from head to foot. |
c. A tight-fitting kind of trousers fastened with ribbons or buttons below the calf, or, later, by straps passing under the boots, which were introduced late in the 18th c., and began to supersede knee-breeches. d. Hence extended to trousers generally (especially in U.S., where this use may have been independently taken directly from F. pantalon, a 1800).
| 1798 [implied in pantalooned]. 1804 C. B. Brown tr. Volney's View Soil U.S. 360 He was dressed in the American style; in a blue suit, with round hat and pantaloons. 1806–7 J. Beresford Miseries Hum. Life (1826) x. lxxxix, Loudly bursting..the fastenings of your braces, and the strings of your pantaloons behind. 1825 Retrospect. Rev. XII. 25 note, In October 1812, an order was made by St. John's and Trinity College, that every young man who appeared in Hall or Chapel in pantaloons or trowsers, should be considered as absent. 1834 J. R. Planché Brit. Costume 316 Pantaloons and Hessians boots were introduced about the same period [i.e. c1789]. 1855 Whittier Barefoot Boy 3 With thy turned-up pantaloons, And thy merry whistled tunes. 1857 Chambers Inform. People I. 798/1 Pantaloons, which fitted close to the leg, remained in very common use by those persons who had adopted them till about the year 1814, when the wearing of trousers, already introduced into the army, became fashionable. 1858 Gen. P. Thompson Audi Alt. I. xlviii. 187 British officers, in all the priggery of sash and white pantaloon. 1865 Dickens Mut. Fr. iii. xi, Dressed in..pepper and salt pantaloons. 1877 M. M. Grant Sun-Maid viii, His loose shirt hung outside his pantaloons. |
e. See quot. and cf. pantalettes.
| 1821 Ladies' Museum Feb. (Parisian news), Female children wear pantaloons of merino, with short petticoats of the same. 1881 in Mrs. Power O'Donoghue Ladies on Horseback v. 235 [For horsewomen] Pantaloons of chamois leather, buttoning close at the ankles. |
4. attrib. and Comb., as pantaloon-like adj.
| 1675 Phillips Theat. Poet, Pref. **iij, Whether the Trunck-Hose Fancy of Queen Elizabeth's days or the Pantaloon Genius of ours be best. a 1822 Shelley Devil xvi. 4 Could make his pantaloon seams start. 1858 Simmonds Dict. Trade, Pantaloon Stuff, material for men's trousers. 1892 Sir J. C. Browne in Pall Mall G. 5 May 7/1, I should describe them as pantaloon-like girls, for many of them had a stooping gait and withered appearance, shrunk shanks, and spectacles on nose. |