Jackboot
A jackboot is a
Cavalry jackboot
The term originally denoted tall ‘winged’ leather cavalry boots, which were reinforced against sword blows by use of mail sewn into the lining of the leather.[citation needed] The ‘wings’ (backward projections) on these high boots particularly protected a rider's knee-joint from a sword blow. These boots are still worn and still so termed by the Household Cavalry regiment of the British Army, initiated during the 17th century. The term originates from the French word jaque meaning ‘coat of mail’.[2][3][4] These boots were made very heavy by the mail reinforcement but are slightly less heavy nowadays because modern materials are used as stiffeners. There are now few manufacturers of cavalry jackboots, the most famous being Schnieder Boots[5] of Mayfair, London, the official supplier to His Majesty the King's Household Cavalry.[6]
Hobnailed jackboot
The second meaning of the term is derived from the first, with reference to their toughness, but is unrelated in design and function, being a
As a metaphor
Totalitarianism
The boots are associated popularly with
Jackboots were also associated with the armies of the former USSR (called sapogi) and East Germany. Jackboots are still a part of the modern parade and service attire of the armies of Russia and some other states.
The word is used often in English as a
In the United States in October 1993, the National Rifle Association (NRA) published a four-page advertisement in the center of its magazine American Rifleman, the first page of which showed goose-stepping, jackbooted legs under the question, "What's the First Step to a Police State?"[11] Two years later, the NRA's executive vice-president, Wayne LaPierre, created controversy when he referred to federal agents as "jack-booted thugs" in an NRA fund-raising letter. The term had been invented by United States Representative John Dingell, Democrat of Michigan, in 1981.[12] Such statements prompted former U.S. president George H. W. Bush to resign his membership in the organization soon afterward.[13]
See also
- Footwraps
- Kirza
- Riding boot
- Thigh-high boots
- Yuft boots
References
- ^ John Carr, The Stranger in France, or, A tour from Devonshire to Paris, (London 1803:32).
- ^ Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
- ^ Chambers's Etymological Dictionary of the English Language
- ^ jaque in the Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).
- ^ Schnieder Boots website
- ^ Schnieder Boots website
- ^ dress Colonial America - Britannica Online Encyclopedia
- ISBN 0-395-72667-0, p. 43
- ^ Gudmundsson, Bruce, Stormtroop Tactics: Innovation in the German Army, 1914–1918, (New York: Praeger Publishing, 1989), 51
- ^ "Jack", 11th Edition of Encyclopædia Britannica
- ^ "What's the First Step to a Police State?". American Rifleman (Advertisement). National Rifle Association of America. October 1993.
- ^ Butterfield, Fox (May 8, 1995). "TERROR IN OKLAHOMA: ECHOES OF THE N.R.A.; Rifle Association Has Long Practice In Railing Against Federal Agents". The New York Times. Retrieved April 7, 2014.
- ^ Bush, George H. W. (3 May 1995). "Letter of Resignation Sent By Bush to Rifle Association". The New York Times. Retrieved 23 July 2015.