Pocket

A pocket is a small bag- or envelope-shaped compartment that is either sewn into or attached to clothing, designed for carrying small items. Pockets are also found on luggage, backpacks, and similar containers. Historically, the term could also refer to a separate pouch or small bag.

Ancient civilizations used leather or cloth pouches to store valuables. The Copper Age mummy known as Ötzi (also called the "Iceman"), who lived around 3,300 BCE, wore a belt with a sewn-on pouch containing tools and materials such as a scraper, drill, flint flake, bone awl, and dried tinder fungus.

In medieval Europe, early pocket-like openings called fitchets appeared in the 13th century. These vertical slits, cut into the outer tunic, allowed access to a purse or keys suspended from the girdle beneath. Historian Rebecca Unsworth notes that pockets became more visible in the late 15th century, and their use spread widely in the 16th century.

Later, pockets were often worn like purses on a belt, concealed under a coat or jerkin to deter pickpocketing, with access through a slit in the outer garment.

By the 17th century, pockets were sewn into men's clothing, while women's remained as separate tie-on pouches hidden beneath skirts.

The word pocket entered Middle English from a Norman diminutive of the Old French poke or pouque, related to modern poche and the English word pouch. The form "poke" is now only used in dialect, or in such proverbial sayings as "a pig in a poke".

In the 17th to 19th centuries, women's tie-on pockets—mentioned in the rhyme Lucy Locket—often carried everyday tools like scissors, pins, needles, and keys.

In modern fashion, men's clothing usually includes pockets, whereas women's clothing often has smaller or even fake ones, sometimes called Potemkin pockets after the concept of a Potemkin village. A 2018 study by the Pudding found that fewer than half of women's front pockets could fit a thin wallet, let alone a phone or keys.