birthday suit

birthday suit

noun
bare skin; nakedness: They were sunbathing in their birthday suits.

Origin:
1745–55

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2013.
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Collins
World English Dictionary
birthday suit
 
n
informal, jocular a state of total nakedness, as at birth

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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00:10
Birthday suit is always a great word to know.
So is callithumpian. Does it mean:
a children's mummer's parade, as on the Fourth of July, with prizes for the best costumes.
a calculus or concretion found in the stomach or intestines of certain animals, esp. ruminants, formerly reputed to be an effective remedy for poison.
Etymonline
Word Origin & History

birthday suit
first attested 1730s, but probably much older. The notion is the suit of clothes one was born in, i.e., no clothes at all. Cf. M.E. mother naked "naked as the day one was born;" M.Du. moeder naect, Ger. mutternackt.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
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American Heritage
Cultural Dictionary

birthday suit definition


To be “in one's birthday suit” is to be completely naked (as people are at birth).

The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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American Heritage
Idioms & Phrases

birthday suit

Nakedness, as in The doorbell rang, and here I was in my birthday suit. In 18th-century Britain this term originally referred to the clothes one wore on the king's birthday. Later it was jocularly transferred to bare skin, alluding to the condition of a newborn baby.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.
Copyright © 1997. Published by Houghton Mifflin.
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