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Portmanteau (luggage)

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Type of leather travelling bag
A 16-inch Gladstone bag made of ox leather
Traditional medical bag

A portmanteau is a piece of luggage, usually made of leather and opening into two equal parts. Some are large, upright, and hinged at the back and enable hanging up clothes in one half, while others are much smaller bags (such as Gladstone bags) with two equally sized compartments.

The word derives from the French word portemanteau (from porter, "to carry", and manteau, "coat") which nowadays means a coat rack but was in the past also used to refer to a traveling case or bag for clothes.

Portmanteau mail bag

Portmanteaux used to carry letters

In the 1700s, the term also described a mail bag. This continued into the 1800s for bags used by the United States Postal Service. An 1823 resolution in Congress further stated that "locks... will be placed on the portmanteaus containing the principal mails can only be opened... at the distributing offices."

References

  1. "Portmanteau definition and meaning - Collins English Dictionary". Collinsdictionary.com.
  2. "A History of Vintage Luggage". Achome.co.uk. Retrieved January 16, 2014.
  3. Petit Robert: portemanteau - "malle penderie" (suitcase in which clothes hang)
  4. "PORTEMANTEAU : Définition de PORTEMANTEAU". Cnrtl.fr.
  5. Chmara, Agnieszka (March 26, 2018). "Portmanteau". Eighteenth Century Lit.pbworks.com. Retrieved September 2, 2023. A 1726 dictionary defines a portmanteau as a Mail or a Cloak Bag...
  6. Marsh, Allison. "US Postal Bag Prototype". National Postal Museum. Retrieved September 2, 2023. In the 19th century, both newspapers and letters were placed in a portmanteau, a round, side-opening, leather bag.
  7. "Mail bag". Shaker Museum and Library. October 19, 2016. Retrieved September 2, 2023. This style of bag, sometimes called a portmanteau, was used by the Post Office Department in the mid-1800s to transport mail...
  8. "Bulloch History with Roger Allen: Nation, Georgia set up Rural Free Delivery mail routes". Statesboro Herald. May 27, 2017. Retrieved September 2, 2023. It directed that here, All letters... are placed in a portmanteau principal mail bag...

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Bags and flexible containers
Carried
Worn
Luggage
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Containers
Purses/handbags
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