Today's word comes out of a necessity for me, from reading an earlier blog post by Troll Steve. He writes (down below here, a few posts down): This is pretty much how I picture all my mounted fighters and NPCs. I love chainmail, the normal helm, kite shield, the tabards, trappings on the horse, banner. All of it. Wizards can go sit on a stump!
The slight to Wizards aside, I had to wrack my brain to remember what a tabard was. It turns out it is:
Tabard -- coarse sleeveless garment worn as the outer dress of medieval peasants and clerics, or worn as a surcoat over armor.
Then I had to wonder what a surcoat was. Don't you just hate an entry that has a word you don't know? So I found this: A surcoat may be defined as being a long coat, and was often sleeveless... A tabard is a looser style of surcoat, which superseded the jupon in the first half of the fifteenth century. The armorial tabard is often depicted emblazoned with arms on the front, back and on both or either sleeve.
Jupon? Just what in the hell is a jupon? Make it stop! Okay, so a jupon is: a tight-fitting garment like a shirt often padded and quilted and worn under medieval armor. It comes from French so then it hit me, like jupe meaning skirt. I took one French class and got a D, but I remember how to count to ten and apparently the word jupe.
So there we have it, a sort of roundabout way to get there, but we have it now. A tabard is sorta like a surcoat and sorta like a jupon.
I need a nap...
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