A sleeve (Old English: slīef, a word allied to slip, cf.The sleeve is a characteristic of fashion seen in almost every country and time period, across a myriad of styles of dress.Early Western medieval sleeves were cut straight, and underarm triangle-shaped gussets were used to provide ease of movement.[1] Various early styles of Western sleeve are still found in types of academic dress.Most contemporary shirt sleeves end somewhere between the mid-upper arm and the wrist.