breech
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /bɹiːt͡ʃ/
rhymes: -iːtʃ
homophone: breach
Forms: form: breeches
Etymology: From Middle English breche, from Old English brēċ, from Proto-Germanic *brōkiz pl, from Proto-Germanic *brōks (“clothing for loins and thighs”). Cognate with Dutch broek, Alemannic German Bruech, Swedish brok. Doublet of vraka.
Senses: examples: text: 'Lat be,' quod he, ‘it shal nat be, so theech!
Thou woldest make me kisse thyn old breech,
And swere it were a relik of a seint,
ref: late 14th century, Geoffrey Chaucer, The Pardoner's Tale, The Canterbury Tales
roman: Thogh it were with thy fundement depeint!'
text: The stallion lipped Alanna’s breech pockets. “He’s spoiled rotten.” Fishing a lump of sugar out, she fed it to him.
ref: 1992, Tamora Pierce, Wild Magic, New York, N.Y.: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, →ISBN, page 57:
text: The typical American combat soldier in World War I wore an olive-drab tunic, stiff at the neck, breech-style trousers, and combat shoes with canvas leggings or, preferably, wrappings.
ref: 2009, John C[oyne] McManus, American Courage, American Carnage: 7th Infantry Chronicles: The 7th Infantry Regiment’s Combat Experience, 1812 Through World War II, New York, N.Y.: Forge, →ISBN, pages 244–245:
text: He reached into his breech pockets. They were huge, but well-tailored and disguised properly within the folds of the pants.
ref: 2015, David Nabhan, The Pilots of Borealis, London: Gollancz, published 2020, →ISBN:
glosses: A garment whose purpose is to cover or clothe the buttocks.
examples: text: And he made a woman for playing the whore, sit upon a great stone, on her bare breech twenty-foure houres, onely with corne and water, every three dayes, till nine dayes were past […]
ref: 1624, John Smith, Generall Historie, Kupperman, published 1988, page 157:
text: When pamper'd Cupids, bestly Veni's, / And motly, squinting Harvequini's, / Shall lick no more their Lady's Br—, / But die of Looseness, Claps, or Itch; / Fair Thames from either ecchoing Shoare / Shall hear, and dread my manly Roar.
ref: 1736, Alexander Pope, Bounce to Fop:
text: "Oho!" says Thwackum, "you will not! then I will have it out of your br—h;" that being the place to which he always applied for information on every doubtful occasion.
ref: 1749, Henry Fielding, chapter VIII, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, book III:
glosses: The buttocks or backside.
topics: engineering
firearms
government
military
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
politics
tools
war
weaponry
coordinate_terms: muzzle
glosses: The part of a cannon or other firearm behind the chamber.
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: The external angle of knee timber, the inside of which is called the throat.
topics: medicine
obstetrics
sciences
glosses: A breech birth.
Derived terms: bear's breech
bear's-breech
be-breeched
breechblock
breech-cloth
breechcloth
breechclout
breech delivery
breech face
breechless
breechloader
breech-loader
breech-loading
breechloading
breech pin
breech screw
nonbreech
quack-breech
quake-breech
quakebreech
rod for one's breech
unbreech
wipe-breech