wool
- 1The soft, thick hair that grows on sheep and some other animals.
Like a warm blanket that grows right on the animal's body.
Sheep grow a thick coat of wool to stay warm through winter.
Farmers shear the wool from their flock every spring.
Similarfleece
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- 2Cloth or yarn made from the hair of sheep.
Like string made from a sheep's soft coat.
She knitted a scarf from soft gray wool.
This sweater is made of pure wool.
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- 3Any soft material that looks or feels like the hair of a sheep.
Like the fluffy stuffing inside a soft toy.
She scrubbed the rusty pan with steel wool.
The walls were packed with mineral wool for insulation.
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- 4Yarn for knitting, even when it is made from man-made threads instead of sheep hair.
She picked up a few balls of wool at the shop to knit a jumper.
This acrylic wool is easier to wash than the pure-sheep kind.
Similaryarn
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- 5A soft fiber made from the leaves of some trees, like pines and firs.
Like getting soft threads from tree leaves instead of from a sheep.
Workers gathered pine needles to make wool for stuffing pillows.
This wool comes from fir leaves, not from animals.
- 6A rude name used in Liverpool for someone from a nearby town.
The locals in the pub teased him for being a wool from St Helens.
Don't call me a wool just because I grew up in Warrington.
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- 7
Less common meaning
- 8Short, thick hair, especially when it is tightly curled.
wool of bat and tongue of dog
c. 1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”Here, wool means short, thick hair, the hair of a bat.Note
Practice
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Origin
This word comes from Old English "wull," going far back to older Germanic and Indo-European roots for wool.