Eponymous

Eponymous (pronounced uh-pon-uh-muhs)

(1) The giving of one's name to something.

(2) Of, relating to, or being the person or entity after which something or someone is named.

1833: The construct was eponym + -ous, from the Ancient Greek ἐπώνυμος (epṓnumos), the construct being ἐπί (epí) (upon) +‎ ὄνυμα (ónuma), a Doric and Aeolic variant of ὄνομα (ónoma) (name).  The word seems first to have been used in the second millennium BC, when, for several decades, the Assyrians named each year after a prominent government official, the alternative form eponymal appearing first in the record in reference to the other classical eponymos, a title of certain magistrates in ancient Greece who gave their names to the years when they held office, a practice later adopted by the English to record statute law.  In England, until 1953, the naming conventions for recording the bills parliament passed used regnal years; a statute gazetted in the seventh year of the reign of George V would have been dated 7 George V and were the system still in use, one passed in 2021 would be sealed 69 Elizabeth II.  Widely used in English (the Victorian age, the Nixon doctrine, the Menzies era etc), eponymic has been used in the sense "name-giving; pertaining to eponymic myths" as well as "of or pertaining to a classical eponymos."  The Greek epṓnymos was derived from onyma (name) the root also of a number of English words, including synonymous, pseudonym and anonymous.   Most dictionaries seem to list the comparative as "more eponymous" and the superlative as "most eponymous" although its difficult to imagine how the terms could be used, something either eponymous or not, unlike a word like "unique" where modifiers ("most unique"; "quite unique" (are now generally accepted (grudgingly by some) although all seem to draw the line at the clumsy "very unique".  Eponymous is an adjective and eponymously is an adverb.

Lohan Nightclub, Athens

Lohan Nightclub is Lindsay Lohan’s eponymous operation in Athens.  Actual ownership seems murky but at least at one point she was said to hold some equity.

Address:      Iera Odos 30-32, Athina, Greece
Telephone:  +30 698 750 1825
Website:      http://lohanathens.com
Facebook:    www.facebook.com/lohannightclub/
E-mail:        info@lohanathens.com

Located in the Kerameikos region of Athens and featuring what’s described as an industrial baroque aesthetic, Lohan Nightclub is described as the only Athenian mega-club.  Opening hours vary with the season and the lighting and sound systems said to be state of the clubbing art.  An entry ticket is €15 (US$15) and VIP tables are available, subject to a minimum spend of around €600 (US$700).  Lohan is said to be a destination for clubbing in its most extreme iteration and it’s suggested if one isn’t wholly committed to all that that implies, one won’t enjoy things.  The Lohan Nightclub’s material on various platforms notes an atmosphere of decadence promising “something decidedly different”, the greeting of bright pink flowers and neon lights promoting the escapist experience within, the overall impression, loud, hedonistic and Lohanic.

Lohan Night Club, Athens, opening night, 15 October 2016.

Lolita

Lolita (pronounced loh-lee-tuh)

(1) A female given name, a form of Charlotte or Dolores.

(2) A 1955 novel by Vladimir Nabokov.

(3) Referencing the eponymous character in the novel, a nymphet (or a representation of one in pornography) or a sexually precocious young girl (usually critically).

Lolita is a female given name of Spanish origin. It is the diminutive form of Lola, a hypocorism of Dolores (Lolita thus a double diminutive) which, depending on the source translates in Spanish as "suffering" or “sorrows”, the latter tending to be preferred because of the link with Maria de los Dolores.  Without any etymological evidence, some other (presumably fanciful) suggestions of meaning have included "a princess who loves pastel colors", "flower of love", "vivacious and beautiful" & "with a man's spirit".

As a given name, Dolores originated from La Virgen María de los Dolore (Virgin Mary of the Sorrows (dolores translating in Spanish as sorrows), one of the many titles given to the Blessed Mother in Spanish Roman Catholic tradition.  In the context of the Roman Catholic Church, Mary’s sorrows refer to seven events which occurred during her lifetime: (1) The Circumcision of Jesus, (2) the Flight from Jerusalem when Mary and Joseph take the baby Jesus to Egypt to protect him from King Herod of Judea’s orders to kill him, (3) the Finding in the Temple when Mary and Joseph lose the child Jesus only to find him later dwelling in the Temple among the elders, (4) Mary’s meeting with Jesus on the way to Calvary, (5) Jesus’ death on the cross, (6) Mary receiving the body of Jesus in her arms after he is taken down from the cross and (7) the placing of Jesus in the tomb.  The most observant Catholics observe a daily ritual in which they recite Our Father and seven Hail Marys in homage to the seven sorrows.  In the Spanish tradition, there are several given names derived from the many epithets given to the Blessed Mother, other examples including Concepción (referring to Mary’s immaculate conception); Corazón (referring to Mary’s immaculate heart); Luz (Our Lady of the “Light”); Mercedes (Our Lady of “Mercy”); Milagros (Our Lady of “Miracles”); Pilar (Our Lady of the “Pillars”); Rosario (Our Lady of the “Rosary”); and Soledad (Our Lady of “Solitude”).  From the late nineteenth century Dolores became popular among American Catholics and Nabokov’s novel seems briefly to have induced a spike in popularity which the later film adaptation (which reached a wider popular audience) may have quelled.  In the US, popularity peaked in 1963 and it’s never really recovered from the prurient associations explored by Nabokov.  Despite the reservations of parents in the English-speaking world, Lolita the name remains popular among Spanish speakers and in Europe.  In Latvia, Lolita’s name day is 30 May.

Sue Lyon in “Lolita Glasses” in Lolita (1962).  The most emblematic of the type are the sunglasses with the heart-shaped lens but the label is applied to many thick-rimmed styles, especially those with the sleek, “cats eye” shape.

Lindsay Lohan in Lolita glasses.

The 1955 novel by Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977) was controversial even before being published in French, English language houses, sensing trouble, having initially declined the manuscript and nor has there ever been any consensus about the literary merit.  Coincidently or not, there had been a Imperial-era German short-story about a girl called Lolita.  Published in 1916 by Heinz von Lichberg (the pen-name of Heinz von Eschwege (1890-1951)), it was not dissimilar in its themes and there are a number of reasons it may have been Nabokov was influenced although, given the structural differences, plagiarism is too strong a word.  Whatever the qualities of the text, it remains interesting as a canvas onto which can be mapped the changing attitudes to child abuse (and its artistic depiction).  Tellingly, when Stanley Kubrick (1928-1999) in 1962 adapted the novel for the screen, many aspects of the original were toned down and twelve-year old Lolita was re-imagined as a child of 14, a change necessitated by the rules in some markets and it may have been hoped that if that was acceptable for William Shakespeare's (1564–1616) Romeo and Juliet (1597), it may have been also good enough for Kubrick’s Lolita.  Even as a morality tale, it was ambiguous; although the transgressive male protagonists all die in various unpleasant ways, so too do Lolita and her mother, the nominal female victims.

Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books (2003).

Reading Lolita in Tehran was a memoir by Iranian-American author and professor of English literature Azar Nafisi (b 1948), documenting her experiences living in the Islamic Republic of Iran between 1979-1997.  Structurally, the work uses books she and seven of her female students (one can see why the ayatollahs judged her subversive) discussed during the meetings of the book club she formed in 1995, one of which was Nabokov's Lolita which, although by then widely available in the West (indeed, for some, part of the canon) was a controversial text in Iran.  Memorably, Professor Nafisi compared Humbert Humbert’s treatment of Lolita with the way the Ayatollahs imposed on women their dreams of what women should be “…turning us into figments of their imagination.”  In both the book and the Islamic state, the crime is “solipsizing the lives of others.”

Sue Lyon, from a photo-shoot by US photographer Bert Stern (1929–2013), pre-release publicity set (1960).

What came to be called “Lolita glasses” (which are to this day marketed under that name) are the thick-rimmed items worn in the 1962 by Sue Lyon (1946-2019, thus aged 14-15 at the time of filming.  The most famous of the glasses, with the heart-shaped lens, were chosen by photographer Bert Stern who Kubrick in 1960 commissioned to produce some still images to be used in pre-release publicity.  Stern was already well known for his photographs of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, and would later create a famous set of images of Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962), the style of which he controversially reprised in 2008 with Lindsay Lohan (b 1986) as the subject.

Popularity of the name Lolita in the US, 1900-2017.  Impressionistically, as might be expected, a film will influence popular culture more than literary fiction, regardless of content.

Pantechnicon

Pantechnicon (pronounced pan-tek-ni-kon or pan-tek-ni-kuhn)

(1) A building or place housing shops or stalls where all sorts of (especially exotic) manufactured articles are collected for sale; most associated with the Pantechnicon, a large warehouse where goods (delivered by Pantechnicon's vans) were stored.

(2) A large van, especially one designed for moving or furniture and other household goods; originally "pantechnicon van".

1820-1830: A creation of modern English using the Ancient Greek, the construct being pan-, from the Ancient Greek πᾰν- (pan-), a neuter form of πᾶς (pâs) (all, every) + τεχνικόν (tekhnikón) (artistic, skillful), neuter singular of τεχνικός (tekhnikós, “technical”), from tekhnē (art), from the primitive Indo-European tetḱ- (to create, produce).  The clippings pantech (UK) & pantech van (Australia) are now less common.  Pantechnicon is a noun; the noun plural is pantechnicons.

The Pantechnicon building, Motcomb Street, Belgrave Square, London.  It was built in what was then called the “Greek Revival” style, featuring a neo-classical facade using Doric columns.  It’s described now as a “contemporary fashion emporium” and includes the inevitable café, restaurant & bar.

A Pantechnicon van (almost always called a pantechnicon and, in certain places. “pantech” endures) was originally horse-drawn and used to transport furniture to and from The Pantechnicon, a bazaar in central London where objects were stored as well as sold.  The Pantechnicon building was built in the early 1830s, the name coined from the Ancient Greek to convey the idea of an institution which traded in all aspects of the arts.  That commercial use continued but the building and the eponymous vans became famous in the twentieth century after the premises were converted into furniture storage warehouse. The warehouse was burnt out in 1876 and suffered another severe blaze in 1939, the latter unfortunate timing as many people had stored there the household effects of grand London houses which were being shuttered for the duration of the war.

Although originally used exclusively to service clients of The Pantechnicon, the design of the vans, being functionally deterministic, was optimized for the task and soon adopted by all removalists, the name to describe the vans quickly becoming generic.  The design persisted when the vans were motorized; now built on truck chassis, they were now even more obviously slab-sided cuboids and the new technology permitted them to become very large.  In a city like London with some narrow lanes and tight corners, some of which dated from the Roman occupation, that presented problems of its own and some small, horse-drawn pantechnicons continued to ply their trade even after the Second World War.

1947 Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith "Pantechnicon" by Hooper.

Being functional work-horses designed for the maximization of internal space and the ease of loading, few commented on the aesthetics but when the same style was adopted in 1947 for a Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith commissioned by an exceedingly rich oil trader called Nubar Gulbenkian (1896-1972), many were aghast and the thing was soon nick-named the Pantechnicon.  Built by the coachbuilder Hooper, it didn’t start a trend for the design although, over the next decade, some details would appear in the cars of many manufacturers because of the contribution to aerodynamic efficiency.  Time has perhaps been kinder to Mr Gulbenkian’s pantechnicon than critics at the time, compared with some of what would be produced in the years that followed, Hooper’s lines had coherence and even a simplicity which, until their bankruptcy, would elude some coachbuilders and certainly, there are more hints of the future in the pantechnicon than most of the Silver Wraiths (1946-1958) which were usually pastiches of pre-war mofifs.

1956 Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith by Hooper.

Unmoved by the staid critics, Mr Gulbenkian continued to favor both the Wraith and Hooper though not their standard range.  While he didn’t again request anything pantechnicon-like, his tastes nevertheless remained eccentric, purchases including a four-door cabriolet (a rarity even then) and a sedanca de ville (a body style thought almost extinct), the latter fully-trimmed in sage-green lizard-skin.  Probably the most dramatic of Gulbenkian’s Hooper-bodied Rolls-Royces was a left-hand drive example built for use on the Côte d’Azur where he kept a house (and reputedly several mistresses); it had conventional four-door saloon coachwork but its novelty lay in its transparent Perspex roof, complete with an electrically-operated fabric inner blind to keep the occupants cool despite the Mediterranean sun.  Eschewing the usual acres of burl walnut which had been a Rolls-Royce signature since the earliest days, the interior was trimmed entirely in leather, a hallmark of all the Gulbenkian cars as was the speedometer fitted in the rear passenger compartment.  So distinctive was the appearance that after it was sold, it was used in the 1964 film Les Félins (released in English-language markets as The Love Cage) which starred Alain Delon (b 1935) and a young Jane Fonda (b 1937).

1966 Mercedes-Benz 600 SWB by Chapron.

Mr Gulbenkian must have been quite taken with the Perspex roof because in 1965, impressed by Mercedes-Benz’s extraordinary new 600 (W100; 1963-1981), he approached them and requested they build him one with such a roof.  Stuttgart declined.  Undeterred, in 1966 Mr Gulbenkian purchased one from the French distributer and had it delivered directly to Henri Chapron’s (1886-1978) coachbuilding studio in Paris to which he provided a specification sheet and what is said to have been a quite professional-looking sketch.  The build took almost a year because, better to enjoy the view through the transparent roof, Mr Gulbenkian fancied the idea of gazing at the stars at night so the rear seats were configured to recline into a bed.  The door panels were equipped with handheld mirrors and glass deflectors designed to minimalize the air turbulence in the cabin. Special tobacco pipe holders were fitted, as well as a minibar.  One piece of German engineering Chapron didn’t try to emulate was to extend the hydraulic control system to operate the roof blinds.  The 600 was unique in that it didn’t use electric motors for things like the windows, these along with the doors, seats, sunroof and trunk (boot) lid instead silently run by a hydraulic system, which ran at an extraordinary 2176 psi (150 bar), something which absorbed about a sixth of the power generated by the 386 cubic inch (6.3 litre) V8 although what remained was sufficient still to propel what was a big, heavy and not obviously aerodynamic car to almost 130 mph (210 km/h).  The 600 was anyway expensive but Chapron's work more than doubled the price.  Mr Gulbenkian who then owned some 5% of BP, didn't quibble.

419 Venice Way, Venice Beach, Los Angeles, 31 January 2012.

This is the pantechnicon Lindsay Lohan hired when moving from where she lived during 2011-2012 in a semi-mirrored construction (a style of architecture sometimes called “pigeon pair”) next door to former special friend Samantha Ronson who inhabited Number 417.  She moved out after being disturbed by "a Freemason stalker".  In North America, this pantechnicon would usually be called a "semi", a clipping of "semi-articulated trailer" and even in the UK the term "pantechnicon" is now less common, as is the Australian clipping "pantech van". 

Mystique

Mystique (pronounced mi-steek)

(1) A framework of doctrines, ideas, beliefs, or the like, constructed around a person or object, endowing the person or object with enhanced value or profound meaning:

(2) The aura of mystery (real, imagined or confected) or mystical power surrounding a particular occupation or pursuit:

1891: A borrowing by English in the sense of “atmosphere of mystery and veneration”, from the French noun & adjective mystique (a mystic; the act of a mystic; the mystical), from the Latin mysticus, from the Ancient Greek μυστικός (mustikós) (secret, mystic), from μύστης (mústēs) (one who has been initiated).  Mystique is a noun; the noun plural is plural mystiques.

A Dangerous Liaison (2008) by Carole Seymour-Jones (1943-2015).

When Le Deuxième Sexe (The Second Sex (1949)) was published by French feminist and social theorist Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986), it was recognized almost at once as a landmark in feminist thought but it was in the twenty-first century re-evaluated when gender came to be re-defined as a spectrum rather than a binary.  Of particular interest was de Beauvoir’s mapping of existentialist thought on to the matter, asserting that being a woman was a construct, something obviously dependent on being born female but the product of processes integral to a society in which women had been defined as inferior to men, a tradition she traces back centuries.  The Second Sex and Dr Germaine Greer’s (b 1939) The Female Eunuch (1970) remain the two most important texts of late twentieth century feminism.  De Beauvoir is one of those writers who led a life which many choose to entangle with what she wrote but The Second Sex is best read by allowing the words to prevail.  

However, the complexity of The Second Sex, infused as it was with strands of French structuralism, meant that it lacked accessibility unless a reader had some background in certain philosophical traditions and it was American feminist Betty Friedan’s (1921–2006) The Feminine Mystique (1963) which, by sheer weight of numbers, proved the greater influence politically, many claiming still it was the work responsible for the emergence of second wave feminism.  The Feminine Mystique is by comparison a slight work and although not of excessive length, is thematically repetitious and can be deconstructed as a long social media post about one woman’s discontent with her life, something to which she (not without justification) links the structure of the patriarchal society in which she exists.  That made it a compelling polemic for the receptive millions of women who read it as their own biographies and ensured its success but it also lent second-wave feminism (which greatly the book at least influenced) a distinctly white, Western, middle-class flavor which asked many of the right questions but ignored (rather than deliberately excluded) most of what lay beyond that fashionable but narrow cultural vista.

Jane Birkin and the mystique of the Birkin Bag

The bag lady: Jane Birkin (with her usual straw bag) and Serge Gainsbourg (1928-1991) at the premiere of their film Slogan, August 1969.

One well-known example of manufactured mystique is that attached to the Birkin Bag manufactured by the French fashion house Hermès, the origin of which was a chance meeting in 1984 on Paris-London shuttle flight between the English actress Jane Birkin (1946-2023) and Jean-Louis Dumas (1938-2010), then executive chairman Hermès.  Ms Birkin was placing her usual straw bag in the overhead locker when “everything fell out” her belongings scattering over her and Monsieur Dumas.  The inevitable conversation ensued and the pair thrown together by circumstances spent the brief flight designing Ms Birkin’s ideal leather bag for weekend travel, the airline’s sick bags improbably used for the first sketches.  Within months, the Birkin was a Hermès part-number.

Ms Birkin said she did for a while use the eponymous bag but, as her children grew, the need to cart around "so much stuff" diminished and she ceased to carry one because it became "just too heavy".  That was a known-phenomenon explored by the women's glossies: "The contents of a handbag increases in direct proportion to available space".  So, the solution Ms Birkin followed was the recommended "smaller bag".  Over the last four decades, the Birkin has become a coveted item, much sought by those attracted by its association with pop-culture celebrities and the price-tag which begins somewhere over US$10,000 and can, for a custom unit, extend into six figures.  Although the Birkin range is advertised both in the printed catalogues and on-line, it’s not a “display item” carried on the shelves of the bricks & mortar stores and it’s long been part of the product’s image that as well as being PoA (price on application), they’re “not for everyone”, Hermès selling them only to someone “suitable”; it’s all part of the mystique.  There has long been speculation about how “real” this mystique may be, the suspicion being that if anyone offers cold hard cash (or its modern equivalent), a store manager would think of their end-of-year bonus and make the sale.  However, in March 2024, two disgruntled (rejected) Birkin customers filed suit in Federal court in California, alleging Hermès was in violation of US antitrust legislation by allowing only those with a “sufficient purchase history” with the company to bag a Birkin.  Essentially, the case hinges on the lure of the right to buy a Birkin being used as an inducement to spend money on shoes, jewellery, scarves and such, the carrot of the bag dangled while the stick is used to force folk to create a “purchase history”.  The suit also noted the company’s sales associates are driving the scheme, thereby gaining benefits for both themselves and Hermès, an important technical point in US antitrust law.

Hermès Birkin 3-en-1: "(1) a canvas clutch topped with the emblematic leather flap, (2) A leather tote with side straps & turnlock and (3) A clutch & tote together recreate the eternal Birkin."  The 3-en-1 is one of many designs in the current range.

Interestingly, it was further alleged the floor staff don’t earn commissions on Birkin bag sales and are instructed to use the handbags only as a device “…to coerce consumers to purchase ancillary products” while only “…those consumers who are deemed worthy of purchasing a Birkin handbag will be shown a Birkin handbag” in a private viewing room.”  Any civilian (ie a non-celebrity or not someone identified as rich) walking into the store and asking to see a Birkin is told they’re “out of stock”.  The lawsuit requested class-action status for thousands of US consumers who bought Hermès goods or were asked to buy them as a prerequisite for buying a Birkin and sought unspecified monetary damages and a court order banning Hermès’s allegedly anti-competitive practices.

A certain, brutish mystique: 1974 Holden Torana L34.

Restrictions on a right to purchase are not unusual.  Ferrari have specified that some of their low-volume models are available only to previous customers and that has sometimes demanded the prior purchase of more than one of the Italian machines.  Whether apocryphal or not, the story is that on more than one occasion, upon being informed of the clause, the buyer would at random pick a Ferrari from the showroom stock and buy it, just to qualify.  Somewhat down the automotive food chain, in 1974 when quietly Holden in Australia introduced their L34 option (a homologation package to ensure certain bits & pieces could be used in racing) for the LH Torana SL/R 5000, although the thing could be registered for road use, it was specified it could be bought only by holders of a certain level of competition licence issued by CAMS (the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport, then the sport's peak regulatory body).  That policy was a pre-emptive strike to ensure there would be no repetition of the moral panic stirred up two years earlier by the tabloid press which claimed the three local manufacturers were selling “160 mph (257 km/h) supercars” to the public, summoning the fear of the usual suspects (males aged 17-25) unleashing these lethal weapons on public roads.  As was often the case in moral panics, the tabloids were being economical with the truth but their campaign spooked the politicians and the manufacturers, the new generation of high-performance machinery swiftly cancelled.  Ironically, when tested, it transpired the L34 package was about durability rather than power or speed and was actually a little slower than a standard SL/R 5000 but the exotic terms & conditions (T&Cs) certainly gained it some mystique.

The Mean Girls (2004) crew on DeviantArt by SBBeauregarde in cosplay mode: Marvel Comics' Mystique.

The Mystique de la Merde 

The word mystique even has a place in what must be one of the darker corners of literary theory.  The term Mystique de la Merde dates from September 1956 when an article by Robert Elliot Fitch (1902-1986) was published in the New Republic.  Fitch was a Congregationalist minister who graduated successively from Yale (1923), the Union Theological Seminary (1926) and Columbia (1929), later becoming a professor of Christian ethics and dean of Berkeley's Pacific School of Religion but he was interested also in literary theory, often as a device by which he could explore the decline in Western society associated with God’s withdrawal from the place.  Fitch’s Mystique de la Merde wasn’t literally “the mystique of shit” but a description of what he detected in literature (and therefore life in general) as “a preoccupation with the seamier, muddier, bloodier aspects of life, as well as, excessively, with sex and money.”  Befitting the decline of civilization, Mystique de la Merde was a deliberately more vulgar version of Nostalgie de la boue (nostalgia for mud), a phrase coined in 1855 by French dramatist Émile Augier (1820–1889) meaning “an attraction for low-life culture, experience, and degradation (in individuals, institutions & culture).”

In his New Republic piece, Fitch started as he intended to continue: "…perhaps we should take note of a brand of piety which may best be characterized as the mystique de la merde. This might be rendered in English as the deification of dirt, or the apotheosis of ordure, or just plain mud mysticism.  At any rate it provides a label for a sectarian cult which appears to have attracted some of the best talent in contemporary literature."  He nominated Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) as a founding father of the cult (he must have been tempted to call him the “high priest”) in whose writing he identified a surfeit of “…fertility, money, blood and iron."  One sex was stirred into that mix (as Hemmingway did), one has, as Fitch noted: all “…the basic ingredients of ultimate reality" as seen by the merde mystics.

Ernest Hemingway in Cuba, 1952.  F Scott Fitzgerald's (1896–1940) wife Zelda (1900–1948) described Hemmingway's novel The Sun Also Rises (1926) as "Bull fighting, bull slinging, and bullshit".  Had she lived, she may have found "Mystique de la Merde" a needless gloss.

Writing in the milieu of the beat generation writers, Fitch observed that in handling what clearly was a literary phenomenon, the critic was at some disadvantage because while writers could function on the “four letter [word] level”, “…the critic must stick to three-syllable words.”  He concluded, presumably not without regret, that: “When we have become honest, we discover that the reigning God is only a devil in disguise" and the real reason for this is that God “…has made us unhappy.”  He cites Mrs Evans in Eugene O'Neill’s (1888–1953) soliloquy heavy Strange Interlude (1928) who affirms that the only good thing is being happy: “I used to be a great one for worrying about what's God and what's devil, but I got richly over it… being punished for no sin but loving much.”  One suspects Fitch might have written a critique of the early twenty-first century with some relish.

Doily

Doily (pronounced doi-lee)

(1) A small ornamental mat, historically in embroidery or of lace (the style later emulated in plastic or paper), placed under plates, vases etc.  In addition to any decorative value, their function is to protect surfaces (such as timber) from spills and scratches.

(2) A small napkin, intended to be used for the dessert course (archaic).

(3) A visually similar circular piece of lace, worn as a head-covering by some Jewish & Christian women.

(4) A wool fabric (obsolete).

Circa 1714:  The small, decorative mats were named after the linen drapery on London’s Strand, run by the Doily family in the late seventeenth century.  They were doubtless one of many products offered in the shop (and probably a minor line) but for whatever reason they were the one which picked up the name and remain admired by some while dismissed by others as kitsch.  Doily is a noun (and historically an adjective); the noun plural is doilies.

Traditionally, most doilies were circular in shape and white or beige but many which were bleached white became beige or grey after repeated launderings.  Hotels and cafés often use the paper versions atop plates on which sandwiches, slices of cake and such are served,  This isn't always ideal because paper chaff (from stamping the holes) sometimes remains partially attached (al la the "hanging chads" made infamous in the Florida vote-count during the 2000 US presidential election), only to become detached and end up in the food.      

The alternative spellings were (and in some cases still are) doiley, doilie, doyly, or doyley, sometimes used deliberately as trade-names.  Various sources claim the family name of those running the eponymous London linen drapery was Doily or Doyly but there’s evidence to suggest it really was Doily, one example from Eustace Budgell (1686–1737), an English politician & writer who was a cousin of Joseph Addison (1672–1719), poet, playwright, essayist and fellow parliamentarian, remembered as the co-founder of The Spectator (1711-1712) magazine.  Budgell wrote dozens of pieces for the magazine (unrelated to the current The Spectator published since 1828 which borrowed the name) and in 1712 one (capitalized as originally printed) recorded:

“The famous Doily is still in everyone’s Memory, who raised a Fortune by finding out Materials for such Stuffs as might at once be cheap and genteel”.

That was a reference to the summer-weight woolen clothing which was much favored at the time because it was comfortable, inexpensive and stylish, a combination of virtues which sometimes still eludes manufacturers of many products.  Doily was attached as an adjective to the distinctive garments in the 1780s as “doily suit” & “doily stuffs” and it was only in 1711 the term was picked-up for the small ornamental napkins used at formal dinners when dessert was served.  The “doily-napkins” were literally sold as such (there were many others but the term became generic) and were available in a variety of forms, some quite elaborate and because these resembled the small mats the shop also sold, they came to lend their name to the style, regardless of whether or not purchased from Mr Doily’s shop.  The doilies in their familiar modern form seem first to have been so described in 1714 although it may be they’d been on sale for many years. 

Doilyed-up: Lindsay Lohan in doily-themed top over pink bikini, Mykonos, Greece, August 2014.

Addison is remembered for many reasons, one of which was his once widely performed play Cato (1712) which, based on the final days of Marcus Porcius Cato Uticensis (known variously in history as “Cato the Younger” & “Cato of Utica”), a conservative Roman senator in the late Republic who died by his own hand, explored issues such as the conflict between individual liberty and the powers of the state.  The work suited the zeitgeist of pre-revolution America and many of its lines became phrases the revolutionaries would make famous in the War of Independence (1775-1783).  Cato enjoyed a macabre coda when Budgell, beset with problems, took his own life by throwing himself into the Thames, his suicide note reading: “What Cato did, and Addison approved, cannot be wrong.”

Because plates come in different shapes, so do doilies and there’s no inherent limitation in design although at some point, a construction ceases to be a doily and becomes a tablecloth.

Visually, doilies are strikingly similar to the head-coverings used in a number of Jewish traditions which some Christian women wear in accordance with scriptural dictate:

1 Corinthians 11:1-13: King James Version (KJV 1611)

1 Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ.

2 Now I praise you, brethren, that ye remember me in all things, and keep the ordinances, as I delivered them to you.

3 But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.

4 Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head.

5 But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if she were shaven.

6 For if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn: but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered.

7 For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.

8 For the man is not of the woman: but the woman of the man.

9 Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.

10 For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels.

11 Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.

12 For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all things of God.

13 Judge in yourselves: is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered?

It’s not one of biblical passages much approved by feminists and nor do they like 1 Corinthians 14:34–35: As in all the churches of the saints, women should be silent in the churches.  For they are not permitted to speak, but should be subordinate, as the law also says.  If there is anything they desire to know, let them ask their husbands at home.  For it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.

Designer colors are also available and because doilies are a popular thing with hobbyists, the available spectrum is close to limitless and some are variegated.

The origin of the surname Doily was Anglo-Norman, from d'Œuilly (Ouilly), the name of several places in Calvados in the Normandy region, from Old French oeil (eye) and Doiley, Doilie, Doyly & Doyley were all Englishized forms of d'Ouilly and its French variants.  In England, apart from the noted draper, the best known was Richard D'Oyly Carte (1844–1901), the theatrical impresario who for years produced the collaborative works of WS Gilbert (1836-1911) & composer Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900) which came to be known as “Savoy operas”, the name derived from Carte’s Savoy Theatre in which many were first performed.  The D’Oyly part of his name was a forename (he was christened Richard D’Oyly Carte) which he used because his father, Richard Carte (1808-1891), was already well-known in the theatrical business and “Dick Carte” presumably wasn’t thought appropriate but “D’Oyly Carte” anyway became cockney rhyming slang for “fart” and in informal use it was later joined by “doily dyke” a synonym of “lipstick lesbian”, the alliterative terms used to contrast a feminine lesbian with those not (described variously as "bull dykes", "butch lesbians", "heavy-duty lesbians" etc).  Except within certain sub-sets of the LGBTQQIAAOP community, both are now proscribed as microaggressions.  The rhyming slang may still be used.

"Japanese car doilies" (more correctly antimacassars & side-curtains) in Toyota Century V12s.

Apparently as culturally obligatory in Tokyo taxis as white gloves used to be for the drivers (though many still follow the tradition), the inevitably white partial seat covers are often referred to as “Japanese seat doilies” but technically, when used to protect the surfaces of chairs, they are antimacassars, the construct being anti- (from the Ancient Greek ἀντι- (anti-) (against, hostile to, contrasting with the norm, opposite of, reverse (also "like, reminiscent of")) +‎ macassar (an oil from the ylang ylang tree and once used to style the hair, the original sources of which were the jungles of the Dutch East Indies (modern-day Indonesia), the product shipped from the port of Macassar.

Fifty years of “continuity with change”: 1967 Toyota Century V8 (left) and 2017 Toyota Century V12 (right).

Produced over three generations (1967-1996; 1997-2017 & since 2018), the Toyota Century is the company’s flagship in the Japanese domestic market (JDM).  Although the Lexus marque was invented to rectify the perception of a “prestige deficit” in the RoW (rest of the world), models from the range were introduced in the home market only in 2005 and the Century has maintained its position at the top of the Toyota tree.  The first generation used a number of Toyota V8 engines which grew in capacity to reach an untypically large (for the JDM) 4.0 litres (245 cubic inch) but the most admired were the 1997-2017 cars (a few hundred of 9500-odd built exported) which used a 5.0 litre (305 cubic inch) V12 unique to the Century.  For political reasons, the factory under-rated the power output of the V12 but it was anyway designed and tuned for smoothness and silence, achieving both to an extent few have matched.  Like the memorable “suicide door” Lincolns of the 1960s, the Century’s external appearance changed little and although there were updates, it needed a trained eye to tell one from another and the 2023 cars still maintain a distinct resemblance to the 1967 original although for various reasons, since 2018 there’s been a reversion to eight-cylinder engines, a 5.0 litre version of the Lexus V8 fitted, augmented with electric motors.  Offered with a choice of leather or cloth interior trim, “Japanese seat doilies” are regularly seen in the Century.

2006 Toyota Century Royal (left) and the 2019 Toyota Century four-door cabriolet built for the Japanese Imperial Household (right).  

The Japanese Imperial Household in 2006 requested Toyota provide a fleet of cars for the royal family and four limousines and one hearse were constructed.  Based on the second generation Century (G50), the range was known as the Century Royal and received the special designation G51.  Following traditional English coach-building practice, the rear compartment was trimmed in a wool cloth while the front used leather and an unusual touch was the fitting of internal granite steps.  The factory released a number of details about the construction but were predictably vague about the “security measures” noting only they were an "integral" part of the design and it’s believed these included Kevlar & metal internal skins (as protection from gunfire or explosive devices) plus a multi-laminate, bullet-proof glass.  Another Century was added to the royal mews in 2019, this time a one-off four-door cabriolet parade car (both Toyota and the palace preferred "convertible").  Although of late heads of state have tended to avoid open-top motoring, while there’s a long Japanese tradition of assassinating politicians, during the last few hundred years emperors have been safe (the rumors about the death in 1912 dismissed by most historians) so the palace presumably thought this a calculated risk.  All the same, it’s doubtful a prime-minister will be invited to sit alongside while percolating through city streets, their faith in Japanese marksmanship unlikely to be as high as their belief His Majesty won't be the target.  It’s believed the ceremonial fleet of the royal mews is now made exclusively by Toyota, ending the use of foreign manufactured cars such as the Mercedes-Benz 770Ks (W07, 1930-1938) and a Rolls-Royce Corniche (1990), the latter the previous open-top parade vehicle.  When in use, the royal cars do not display number plates but are instead adorned with a gold-plated, stylized chrysanthemum, the symbol an allusion to the Chrysanthemum Throne (皇位, kōi (imperial seat)), the throne of the Emperor of Japan.  As far as is known, the cars in the royal mews are not fitted with “Japanese seat doilies”.