- skip - Brewer’s

Tafʹfata or Taffety

.

A fabric made of silk; at one time it was watered; hence Taylor says, “No taffaty more changeable than they.” “Notre mot taffeta est formé, par onomatopée, du bruit que fait cette étoffe.” (Francisque-Michel.)

⁂ The fabric has often changed its character. At one time it was silk and linen, at another silk and wool. In the eighteenth century it was lustrous silk, sometimes striped with gold.

Taffata phrases. Smooth sleek phrases, euphemisms. We also use the words fustian, stuff, silken, shoddy, buckram, velvet, satin, lutestring, etc., etc., to qualify phrases and literary compositions spoken or written.


“Taffata phrases, silken terms precise,

Three-piled hyperpoles.”


Shakespeare: Love’s Labour’s Lost, v. 2.

 

previous entry · index · next entry

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.

previous entry · index · next entry

Table-Turning
Tableaux Vivants (French, living pictures)
Tabooed
Taborites
Tabouret
Tabulæ Toletanæ
Tace
Tachebrune
Tænia Rationis
Taë-pings
Taffata or Taffety
Taffy
Tag Rag, and Bobtail
Taghairm
Taherites
Tail
Tails
Tails
Tailors
Tailor’s Sword (A), or A Tailor’s Dagger
Take a Back Seat (To)