Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A short, tight-fitting jacket, traditionally worn by sailors.
- n. See mess jacket.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A short close-fitting coat or jacket, generally made of stout material, as pilot-cloth, much worn by sailors in cold weather; a Guernsey frock.
Wiktionary
- n. dated A type of close-fit jacket worn by sailors
- n. A semiformal lightweight jacket, usually made of nylon, with striped cuffs and neck, similar to an MA-1 flight jacket.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. a short closely fitting jacket, worn by sailors.
WordNet 3.0
- n. waist-length jacket tapering to a point at the back; worn by officers in the mess for formal dinners
Etymologies
- From its resemblance to the jacket worn by an organ grinder's monkey. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Formless music issued from behind its plush, while a boy in a monkey jacket flicked his hips on the heavier beats.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘monkey jacket’.
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Mobying Along
looks like there's not an open Moby Dick list. So now there is.
hypos, Manhattoes, circumambulate, mole, grapnels, bowsprit, asphaltic, mazy, tranced, cataract, ungraspable, judgmatically and 227 more...
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Moby Dick
Words of interest from the book Moby Dick.
arrant, obstreperously, coffer-dam, farrago, rejoinder, counterpane, hamper, commend, grego, dreadnought, psalmody, expostulation and 85 more...
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Moby-Dick
Interesting words and usages.
hypo, spile, hunks, grapnel, squitchy, skrimshander, monkey jacket, direful, grego, wrapall, dreadnaught, bosky and 158 more...
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Like True Newfoundlanders
A place for me to store my Newfoundland English, as I learn it. (Might take a while.)
screech-in, screech, moose milk, bucklish, buckly, buckaloon, buccaloon, newfoundland sock, rum runner, scravel, newfoundland, oonchook and 112 more...
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whaling terms
Terms defined in the glossary of Clifford W. Ashley's "Yankee Whaler".
advance, adze, after house, after oar, agent, air up, alow, ambergris, apeak, article, away, bailer and 299 more...
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Baby, It's Cold Outside!
Do as your mom says and put on a jacket.
frock coat, doublet, reefer, cutaway, morning coat, tailcoat, dinner jacket, smoking jacket, juste-au-corps, jerkin, basque, spencer and 134 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for monkey jacket.
chained_bear Hey! I found this in a song recently, "Banks of Newfoundland."
*steals it*
Lyrics are something like
"When you sail on them packet boats,
No dungaree jackets wear
But have a big monkey jacket all ready to your hand
For there blow some cold northwesters on the banks of Newfoundland." Jul 23, 2008
yarb We were fain to button up our monkey jackets, and hold to our lips cups of scalding tea with our half frozen fingers.
- Melville, Moby-Dick, ch. 3 Jul 23, 2008