Breeches, broaches, and brooches

The Snarky Editor takes on a confusing range of clothes, jewelry, and confidences

The differences between breech and breach, and between brooch and broach, seem to give authors a great deal of trouble. The Snarky Editor will try her best to sort out the facts. (You’re welcome!)

In alphabetical order:

Breach means to break. The thing that’s broken might be a law, or a promise, or someone’s trust. It might even be a wall, in the case of a seige, when the enemy bursts through a city’s defenses. When we use “breach,” something gets broken.

Breech (or, more often, breeches) means a set of short trousers, usually worn with knee-high stockings. In the old days, a boy was sometimes said to be “breeched” when he graduated from the long dress-like garments of babyhood into big-boy pants.

Breech can also refer to the part of a firearm behind the bore, or barrel. A breech-loader rifle was armed by loading ammunition into the breech (rather than dropping it down the barrel as in earlier arms.)

Broach means to mention, often for the first time, or to open a subject for discussion.

Broach can also mean opening a container — broaching a keg of wine, for instance.

Brooch means a decorative pin or ornamental fastener. Interestingly, it’s most often pronounced with a long O, so it sounds just like broach. (There’s nothing quite like the English language when it comes to finding new ways to be confusing.)

Her hands found the laces of his breaches.

Well, no, that would be breeches. It does seem a wee bit unusual, though, that he’s stopping her from taking off his trousers.

I’m not breeching confidence here…”

No, he’s breaching confidence — breaking an implied promise to Mrs. Nash to keep her secrets.

A starched white blouse, a horsehead broach…

And that pin she’s wearing would be a brooch.

I broached the subject of the book.

And hallelujah, we have a winner! This author got it exactly right — the speaker has brought up a new topic of coversation when she broached the subject.

The Snarky Editor comes out of hiding occasionally to comment on the awkward, silly, and sometimes hilarious editing errors found in published books.

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Leigh Michaels is the award-winning author of more than 100 books, including historical and contemporary romance, non-fiction books about writing, and local history. More than 35 million copies of her books are in print in 27 languages and more than 120 countries. She is also a writing coach and book editor, though she promises to be snarky only in regard to published books.

To find out more, check out https://leighmichaels.com