Other forms: berets
A beret is a soft round flat cap with no brim. A black beret, wear a beret, the green beret.
It is made from a single piece of felted wool, and traditional Basque and French berets are still made that way. In the military the colour of the beret identifies the unit, and green beret, red beret and blue beret are all shorthand for the men who wear them. Note that the beret is worn pulled to one side, and which side depends on the army.
1nounberetA soft round flat cap with no brim.
“The painter wore a black beret tilted to one side.”
beret is a hat.
French béret comes from Gascon berret, a cap, from Medieval Latin birretum, from a Gaulish word for a short cloak. Biretta, the clerical cap, is the same word.
Proto-Celtic
*birros — short
cel-gau
birrus — short cloak
Latin
birrus — large hooded cloak
Medieval Latin
birretum
Old Occitan
berret
French
béret
English, today
beret
Built from
French béret, from Occitan - (Gascon) berret (“cap”), from Old Occitan berret, from Medieval Latin birretum, from Latin birrus (“large hooded cloak”), from cel-gau birrus (“short cloak”), from Proto-Celtic birros (“short”) (compare Welsh byr, mga berr). Compare biretta.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA