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furbelow (FUR-buh-loh) - n., a ruffle, flounce, or fringe on a garment, curtain, tablecloth, or the like; a piece of showy ornamentation. v., to decorate with or as with a furbelow.
Has nothing whatsoever to do with fur -- think of, say, the pleated hem of a flamenco dancer's skirt -- though the connotation of something ostentatiously showy is strong. We got the word in the late 17th century as a heavily altered version of either French falbala, ruffle, or its source, Provençal farbello/farbella, ruffle/fringe, itself an alteration of Italian faldella, pleat, diminutive of falda, flap, from Frankish *falda, to fold (which also entered Old English and became Modern English fold), from a Germanic root, from PIE *pel-, to fold.
---L.
Has nothing whatsoever to do with fur -- think of, say, the pleated hem of a flamenco dancer's skirt -- though the connotation of something ostentatiously showy is strong. We got the word in the late 17th century as a heavily altered version of either French falbala, ruffle, or its source, Provençal farbello/farbella, ruffle/fringe, itself an alteration of Italian faldella, pleat, diminutive of falda, flap, from Frankish *falda, to fold (which also entered Old English and became Modern English fold), from a Germanic root, from PIE *pel-, to fold.
---L.
