In the program of Europe 1 "Historically yours", Stéphane Bern is interested in the origins of certain words.
This Friday, the host stops on the etymology of the bra and looks back on its history.
Stéphane Bern suggests every day, in Historically yours with Matthieu Noël, to discover a word that we use every day without necessarily knowing its origin. This Friday, the host returns to the bra, an essential object for the fairer sex.
"I noticed that literally, the bra does not support the throat at all. The throat comes from the Latin gurgès, which means the abyss. It evokes a narrow passage between two mountains. So we can deduce that etymologically, the word rather defines the space between the breasts. Before 1904, one said "maintains throat" or "corselet throat". The word brassiere was also used. It will also give the word "bra" in English, which designates a support -throat.
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Each era has its own customs.
During the Roman Empire, one tightens his chest with the help of bandages to erase femininity.
In the Middle Ages, gourgandines were worn: corsets laced in the back, which would be banned in 1370.
A split between the waist cincher and the corset
In fact, we owe the object as the origin of the word bra, to Herminie Cadolle.
She was the one who came up with the idea of dividing the waist cincher from the corset.
Feminist communard and friend of Louise Michel, Herminie Cadolle signs the stop of the corset and that's good because it dangerously compressed the chest cages of women, leading among other things to scoliosis, miscarriages and fainting.
Only one question actually remains, and we owe it to actor Eddie Murphy: "If love is blind, why is lingerie so popular?" I admit I don't have the answer. "