Closets and Wardrobes

[Carol]

Lee Storm wrote:
> And Geoff, I believe, said that our "Dresser" in the bedroom would
be a "Dressing table" in the UK.  Well, we do have dressing tables
which some call a "Vanity" which is a table top supported by drawers
or a small cabinet or cupboard on one or both sides and has a mirror
at the back of it, sometimes with lights on the mirror...sort of like
a desk-styled thing.

Carol: Right. The difference between that and a dresser (a chest of
drawers with a mirror on top) is that at a dresser, there's no place
to put your legs and it's hard to sit comfortably. (the mirror on mine
is quite tall, and if I stand back far enough (I'm tall), I can see
myself from the top of my head to my knees. It would be quite awkward,
however, to sit there to style my hair or put on makeup if I did that
sort of thing, which I don't. (I imagine that Hepzibah Smith is
sitting at what we would call a dressing table or vanity when we see
her dabbing rouge on her face, but I can't find "dressing table" or
any similar term used in that memory--admittedly, I didn't look very
carefully.)

> Lee :-)
> (Who still wants to know how the word "Bureau" came to mean that in
which we place clothing.)

Carol:
I think the etymology explains it:

"Etymology:
    French, desk, cloth covering for desks, from Old French burel
woolen cloth, from Old French *bure, from Late Latin burra shaggy cloth
Date: 1699"

So the better question might be how "bureau" came to refer to a group
of administrators. Maybe it's related to the evolution of the term
"board," which originally meant "table." The "chairman," IIRC, was the
one privileged to sit in a chair at the end of the table (rather than
on a bench alongside the table). Or maybe everyone else was standing.

Carol, now wondering whether judges originally sat on benches rather
than chairs in the early English courts ("approach the bench")