{"id":24589,"date":"2026-05-09T13:42:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T13:42:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=24589"},"modified":"2026-05-09T13:42:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T13:42:13","slug":"dressed-to-pieces","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=24589","title":{"rendered":"Dressed to Pieces"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The word <strong>\u30ef\u30f3\u30d4\u30fc\u30b9<\/strong> (wanp\u012bsu) came up in my Japanese lessons the other day. You could translate it as <strong>&#8216;one-piece&#8217;<\/strong>, and it refers to an article of clothing, but which one?<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/sendofu\/33779036716\/in\/photolist-gsTJTF-TmswbE-TsWoLL-brNdrh-pBb6UT-T4gg7E-SzyFTA-6LnRXR-QadT7u-idBtiz-gCTXjz-gCTXmZ-dwdSb6-bBpb9t-2e6Rdzt-TaqgDv-JAW1HD-bsjSom-UPsgNK-zX4R1U-ZHuia9-xqPSyY-2e6RduZ-RcVu4T-zX4u1N-zVzaGg-zX91fZ-HcbMRu-T4gmFf-RVsZdD-bsjSkW-Acm6c1-AeDidZ-2fuKbP6-iaxmqG-2fuKbM2-24Tbzbt-QmcquF-zhKzND-AeDd6p-oHiRQL-AcmrBQ-xqTKWT-SY1BfK-S3TwqS-kDtrWr-P4QeL1-xHmFAK-9YZBSg-P7C9aX\" title=\"SDF_2147\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/3846\/33779036716_97964f3f46_z.jpg\" width=\"640\" height=\"426\" alt=\"SDF_2147\"\/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u30ef\u30f3\u30d4\u30fc\u30b9<\/strong> (wanp\u012bsu) [w\u00e0\u0144p\u00ed\ua71c\u00ecs\u00f9] actually refers to a dress or other piece of clothing that comes in one piece, such as a bathing costume \/ swimsuit, and can be shortened to <strong>\u30ef\u30f3\u30d4<\/strong>(wanpi). It was borrowed from the English term <strong>one-piece<\/strong>, which is an adjective meaning &#8216;composed of a single integral unit, or so appearing&#8217;, e.g. a one-piece metal hammer, or a one-piece article of clothing, especially a swimsuit [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/%E3%83%AF%E3%83%B3%E3%83%94%E3%83%BC%E3%82%B9\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u30ef\u30f3\u30d4\u30fc\u30b9<\/strong> (wanp\u012bsu) or <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/One_Piece_(1999_TV_series)\"><strong>One Piece<\/strong><\/a> is also a manga series, an anime TV series and media franchise. Here&#8217;s some music from one of the One Piece spin offs, One Piece film RED, sung by Ado:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/efPWFyozn1s?si=EhwcPB0WXBgwiPaR\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>A similar word is <strong>\u30c4\u30fc\u30d4\u30fc\u30b9<\/strong> (ts\u016bp\u012bsu) [ts\u0268\u02d0p\u02b2i\u02d0s\u0268], which means a two-piece suit, particular women&#8217;s suits. It comes from English <strong>two-piece<\/strong>, which refers to a suit or dress in two pieces [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/%E3%83%84%E3%83%BC%E3%83%94%E3%83%BC%E3%82%B9#Japanese\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>Similar words are also found in Korean: <strong>\uc6d0\ud53c\uc2a4<\/strong> (wonpiseu) [w\u028c\u0339np\u02b0i(\u02d0)s\u02b0\u026f] = dress, and <strong>\ud22c\ud53c\uc2a4<\/strong> (tupiseu) [\u02c8t\u02b0u(\u02d0)p\u02b0i(\u02d0)s\u02b0\u026f] = two-piece suit \/ dress [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/%EC%9B%90%ED%94%BC%EC%8A%A4#Korean\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>Another word for <strong>dress<\/strong> in Japanese is <strong>\u30c9\u30ec\u30b9<\/strong> (doresu), which was borrowed from English <strong>dress<\/strong> [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/%E3%83%89%E3%83%AC%E3%82%B9\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>Incidentally, the English word <strong>dress<\/strong> comes from Middle English <em>dressen<\/em> (to arrange, put in order, to direct or aim), from Anglo-Norman \/ Old French <em>drecier<\/em> (to stand up, get to one&#8217;s feet), from Late Latin <em>*d\u012br\u0113cti\u0101re<\/em> (to guide, direct, put in order), from Classical Latin <em>d\u012br\u0113ctus<\/em> (laid straight, direct, straight), from Proto-Italic <em>*dwizrektos<\/em>, from <em>d\u012brig\u014d<\/em> (lay straight, direct, distribute) [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/dress#English\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>Words from the same roots include <strong>address<\/strong>, <strong>adriot<\/strong> (deft, dexterous, skillful) and <strong>direct<\/strong> in English, <strong>dresser<\/strong> (to raise, build, lift, prepare) in French, <strong>addirizzare<\/strong> (to straighten, correct, direct, guide) in Italian, <strong>d\u00edreach <\/strong> (straight, direct, exact) in Irish, and <strong>derecho<\/strong> (straight, upright, right, correct) in Spanish [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/dirigo#Latin\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-5001128073855040\"\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script><br \/>\n<!-- Blog horizontal --><br \/>\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\n     style=\"display:block\"\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-5001128073855040\"\n     data-ad-slot=\"1685480124\"\n     data-ad-format=\"auto\"\n     data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n<\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The word \u30ef\u30f3\u30d4\u30fc\u30b9 (wanp\u012bsu) came up in my Japanese lessons the other day. You could translate it as &#8216;one-piece&#8217;, and it refers to an article of clothing, but which one? \u30ef\u30f3\u30d4\u30fc\u30b9 (wanp\u012bsu) [w\u00e0\u0144p\u00ed\ua71c\u00ecs\u00f9] actually refers to a dress or other piece of clothing that comes in one piece, such as a bathing costume \/ swimsuit, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[85,104,107,111,127,128,129,131,10,15,26,34,46,64,216,78],"tags":[623,164,158,546,564,138,281,621,622,163,620],"class_list":["post-24589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anglo-norman","category-english","category-etymology","category-french","category-irish","category-italian","category-japanese","category-korean","category-language","category-latin","category-middle-english","category-old-french","category-proto-italic","category-spanish","category-vulgar-latin-sermo-vulgaris","category-words-and-phrases","tag-dress","tag-english","tag-etymology","tag-japanese","tag-korean","tag-language","tag-omniglot","tag-one-piece","tag-two-piece","tag-words","tag-620"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24589"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24589\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24593,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24589\/revisions\/24593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}