Duffel

Duffel is a thick, heavy, coarse woolen with a soft raised nap, named for the town of Duffel near Antwerp where it was made from the 1600s. Its warmth and weather resistance made it a working and military cloth, and it gave its name to two enduring objects: the duffel coat, the hooded toggle-and-rope coat issued to the Royal Navy and made famous by Field Marshal Montgomery, and the duffel bag, the cylindrical sack first sewn from the same cloth. The fabric is the rare case of a town's name surviving in everyday English through the goods it once shipped.

Illustration: a windswept naval quayside in the 1940s, sailors in hooded toggle coats seen from behind hauling a long cylindrical kit bag, a grey sea and the dark hull of a ship beyond, low cloud — A windswept naval quayside in the 1940s, sailors in hooded toggle coats seen from behind hauling a long cylindrical kit bag, a grey sea and the dark hull of a ship beyond, low cloud.

Named for

Named for Duffel, the Flemish town near Antwerp where the cloth was first made.

Also known as

duffle

Common questions

What is Duffel made of?: Duffel is a thick, heavy, coarse woolen with a soft raised nap, named for the town of Duffel near Antwerp where it was made from the 1600s.
What is Duffel named after?: Named for Duffel, the Flemish town near Antwerp where the cloth was first made.