cotton

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A soft cloth or thread made from the cotton plant.

   She wore a light cotton dress on the hot summer day.

2. 2
   noun

   The plant grown to produce this soft white material.

   Vast fields of cotton stretched across the southern farmland.

3. 3
   verb

   To begin to like or get along with someone or something.

   The new student quickly cottoned to her classmates.

1560s, either from Welsh cydun, cytun (“agree, coincide”) (cyduno, cytuno), from cyd, cyt + un (“one”), literally “to be at one with”, or by metaphor with the textile, as cotton blended well with other textiles, notably wool in hat-making.

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