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COTTON
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Fabric woven from cotton fibers
Classified under:
Nouns denoting man-made objects
Hypernyms ("cotton" is a kind of...):
cloth; fabric; material; textile (artifact made by weaving or felting or knitting or crocheting natural or synthetic fibers)
Meronyms (substance of "cotton"):
cotton; cotton fiber; cotton wool (soft silky fibers from cotton plants in their raw state)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "cotton"):
gauze; gauze bandage ((medicine) bleached cotton cloth of plain weave used for bandages and dressings)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Thread made of cotton fibers
Classified under:
Nouns denoting man-made objects
Hypernyms ("cotton" is a kind of...):
thread; yarn (a fine cord of twisted fibers (of cotton or silk or wool or nylon etc.) used in sewing and weaving)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "cotton"):
lisle; lisle thread (a strong tightly twisted cotton thread (usually made of long-staple cotton))
Sense 3
Meaning:
Erect bushy mallow plant or small tree bearing bolls containing seeds with many long hairy fibers
Synonyms:
cotton; cotton plant
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("cotton" is a kind of...):
bush; shrub (a low woody perennial plant usually having several major stems)
Meronyms (parts of "cotton"):
cottonseed (seed of cotton plants; source of cottonseed oil)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "cotton"):
Gossypium arboreum; tree cotton (East Indian shrub cultivated especially for ornament for its pale yellow to deep purple blossoms)
Gossypium barbadense; sea island cotton; tree cotton (small bushy tree grown on islands of the Caribbean and off the Atlantic coast of the southern United States; yields cotton with unusually long silky fibers)
Gossypium herbaceum; Levant cotton (Old World annual having heart-shaped leaves and large seeds with short greyish lint removed with difficulty; considered an ancestor of modern short-staple cottons)
Gossypium hirsutum; upland cotton (native tropical American plant now cultivated in the United States yielding short-staple cotton)
Gossypium peruvianum; Peruvian cotton (cotton with long rough hairy fibers)
Egyptian cotton (fine somewhat brownish long-staple cotton grown in Egypt; believed to be derived from sea island cotton or by hybridization with Peruvian cotton)
Arizona wild cotton; Gossypium thurberi; wild cotton (shrub of southern Arizona and Mexico)
Holonyms ("cotton" is a member of...):
genus Gossypium; Gossypium (herbs and shrubs and small trees: cotton)
Sense 4
Meaning:
Soft silky fibers from cotton plants in their raw state
Synonyms:
cotton; cotton fiber; cotton wool
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("cotton" is a kind of...):
plant fiber; plant fibre (fiber derived from plants)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "cotton"):
absorbent cotton (cotton made absorbent by removal of the natural wax)
long-staple cotton (cotton with relatively long fibers)
short-staple cotton (cotton with relatively short fibers)
Holonyms ("cotton" is a substance of...):
cotton (fabric woven from cotton fibers)
cushioning; padding (artifact consisting of soft or resilient material used to fill or give shape or protect or add comfort)
Derivation:
cottony (resembling cotton; as soft as cotton)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Take a liking to
Example:
cotton to something
Classified under:
Hypernyms (to "cotton" is one way to...):
like (find enjoyable or agreeable)
Sentence frame:
Somebody ----s PP
Context examples:
It is a form of a chemical taken from the seed of the cotton plant (Gossypium).
(Gossypol acetic acid, NCI Dictionary)
And secretly she added to herself, Lord bless me! when should I ever have thought of putting by in cotton a piece of court-plaister that Frank Churchill had been pulling about!
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
But it's actually the nickname for a unique and rare class of young exoplanets that have the density of cotton candy.
('Cotton Candy' Planet Mysteries Unravel in New Hubble Observations, NASA)
I sponged the wound, cleaned it, dressed it, and finally covered it over with cotton wadding and carbolised bandages.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
A characteristic of a medicinal product, specifying that its most predominant agreeable savor detected by the unified sensation of taste and olfactory receptors resembles cotton candy.
(Cotton Candy Flavor, NCI Thesaurus)
Following the housewarming, which was accomplished by means of seal-oil and a wick made from cotton calking, came the hunting for our winter’s meat and the building of the second hut.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
Her resolute effort threw back the lid, and gave to her astonished eyes the view of a white cotton counterpane, properly folded, reposing at one end of the chest in undisputed possession!
(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)
To take what had been the gift of another person, of a brother too, impossible! it must not be! and with an eagerness and embarrassment quite diverting to her companion, she laid down the necklace again on its cotton, and seemed resolved either to take another or none at all.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
Before I went to sleep, I gave him to understand that I had some valuable furniture in my box, too good to be lost: a fine hammock, a handsome field-bed, two chairs, a table, and a cabinet; that my closet was hung on all sides, or rather quilted, with silk and cotton; that if he would let one of the crew bring my closet into his cabin, I would open it there before him, and show him my goods.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
Swiping a cotton swab around the capsaicin patch consistently caused control participants to feel pain, which allowed each one to correctly identify where the inflammation was even though they could not see their arms.
(Study identifies gene that makes gentle touch feel painful after injury, National Institutes of Health)
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