BVDs
English edit
Etymology edit
From the initials of an early manufacturer: Bradley, Voorhees & Day (founded 1876).
Noun edit
BVDs pl (plural only)
- (informal, initialism) Men's underpants.
- 1953, Richard Bissell, “7½ Cents”, in Atlantic, Little, Brown, page 53:
- The dealers apparently got a big inventory and since the war all nobody seems to be buying pajamas. Learned to sleep in their ‘BVDs’ during the war years in the armed services all these young men did.
- 1953, Saul Bellow, chapter 5, in The Adventures of Augie March, New York: Viking Press, →OCLC, pages 64–65:
- Thus, the light switched on, there was Einhorn in his BVDs, wasted arms freckled, grizzled hair afly from his face that was inclined to flatness, the shrewd curved nose and clipped mustache.
- 1970, John Glassco, Memoirs of Montparnasse, New York, published 2007, page 97:
- We frolicked like dolphins – Graeme and I in shorts and Bob in his B.V.D.'s – and then stretched out on the ancient waveworn shingle to let the sinking sun dry and warm us.
Usage notes edit
- To make clear the exact quantity being discussed may require the use of "pair of BVDs" or "(however many) pairs of BVDs".
Derived terms edit
Descendants edit
- → Spanish: bividí
