invisibles

[prettygoodword]

invisibles - n., female underwear.


Victorian slang, and never common as far as I can tell. So called because they were not supposed to be seen.

Bonus word: ish kabibble, also spelled ish gebibble, ish kabbible, ish kabibbul, and ish ki bibbel.

---L.

Comments

[julian]

Man, I love ish kabibble and variants. Thank you for etymological links.

(I mostly know "unmentionables" as the Chosen Victorian Slang for underwear, so that's fun.)

[prettygoodword]

(There's a few variations on that -- this was the most interesting I've met.)

[de_eekhoorn]

The Kay Kyser novelty big band used to have a singer with the stage name Ish Kabibble, possibly because of a song he recorded with the same title. I'm not saying anything about the quality of these songs, but they exist...

[prettygoodword]

Kay Kyser gets mentioned in articles about the word.

[de_eekhoorn]

Interesting.