manteau

English

Borrowed from French manteau (“mantle”). In the Iranian context, borrowed from Persian (mânto), originating in the Qajar period. Doublet of mantle and mantel.

manteau (plural manteaus or manteaux)

A cloak or gown, especially of a kind popular with women in the 17th and 18th centuries.
- 2006, Thomas Pynchon, “Against the Day”, in Against the Day, New York, N.Y.: Penguin Press, →ISBN, page 816:
  Not to mention the need to keep her manteau from becoming a sort of anti-parachute which sought to lift her free of the pavement.
A long, loose-fitting coat worn by Iranian Muslim women based off the trenchcoat, originally worn with a square Arabic-style hijab and in plain colours, and often associated with liberal politics.
Coordinate term: chador
- 2010, Afshin Molavi, The Soul of Iran: A Nation's Struggle for Freedom, W. W. Norton & Company, →ISBN, page 91:
  As a result of this politics of personal appearance, Iranians have come to refer to three types of woman, defining their politics by the clothes they wear: the chadory, the manteauy, and the maghna'eh-poosh. […] In contrast, the manteauy woman wears the loose-fitting manteau, often fashionably with a colorful, loosely tied head scarf. She generally supports both political and social reform.