English

An 1855 portrait of Spanish author Carolina Coronado by Federico de Madrazo, from the collection of the Museo del Prado in Madrid, Spain. Coronado is shown wearing a mantilla.

Noun

mantilla ‎(plural mantillas)

1. A lace veil of Spanish origin worn over a woman's hair and shoulders.
   • 1836 July, “London Fashionable Chit-Chat”, in The Lady's Magazine and Museum of the Belles-lettres, Fine Arts, Music, Drama, Fashions, &c., volume IX, London: Dobbs & Co., Hemlock Court, Carey Street, Lincolns Inn (Formerly at 112, Fetter Lane), OCLC 5140771156, page 73:

     [M]y eyes were oft times [on the] charmante maitresse de la maison, who glided among her guests in her flowing Spanish mantilla, and train of the clearest blonde, doing her devoirs with winning kindness, and showing how much benevolence of manner adds to beauty.

   • 1842 August, “Rushings; or British Popular Vagaries”, in Fraser's Magazine for Town and Country, volume XXVI, number CLII, London: G. W. Nickisson, 215 Regent Street, (Successor to the late James Fraser), OCLC 5899443, page 223:

     Still the mantilla preserved its sway; it had taken a fast hold of the affections of all classes of the feminine gender; and there is now as much chance of driving roast-beef from our shores as there is of transporting black mantillas. […] no squire's lady, no duke's duchess, no countess, and no queen, can or need, in these days of mantillas, be without one of these coverlids for the shoulders, these hiders of all deformities, and these friends to all ages and proportions. For there are mantillas from seven shillings to seven pounds,—of all sizes and shapes, with or without fringe, lace, tassels, and other ornaments.

   • 1855, “Mantillas and Shawls”, in Graham's American Monthly Magazine of Literature, Art, and Fashion, volume XLVI, number 4, Philadelphia, Pa.: Abraham H. See, 106 Chestnut Street, OCLC 145146808, page 578:

     Mantillas are larger than last year, and are generally all worn with a deep flouncing, either of the same material, or of black lace; the mantilla itself is also much trimmed with small ruchings of ribbon, guip and guipure lace, laid on quite flat. […] Black lace shawls and mantillas will always be in the best taste—the Spanish origin of the Empress Eugénie, having given her a penchant for these articles, the national mantilla of her country, of which we have borrowed the name.

2. A woman's light cloak or cape made of silk, velvet, lace, or other material.
   • 1980 October, New Writing and Writers, volume 18, London: John Calder (Publishers) Ltd., ISBN 978-0-7145-3774-0, OCLC 2936348, page 50:

     The Duchess of Alba wrapped herself in a mantilla coat, asked her guest to take a chair in the middle of the patio and placed herself three steps behind him in the shade of a magnolia.

Related terms

• mandil
• mandylion

Translations

Spanish

Etymology

manta +‎ -illa

Noun

mantilla f ‎(plural mantillas)

1. mantilla