Definition of "cotton" []

• Any of various shrubby plants of the genus Gossypium, having showy flowers and grown for the soft white downy fibers surrounding oil-rich seeds. (noun)
• The fiber of any of these plants, used in making textiles and other products. (noun)
• Thread or cloth manufactured from the fiber of these plants. (noun)
• The crop of these plants. (noun)
• Any of various soft downy substances produced by other plants, as on the seeds of a cottonwood. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Vermont, in the year following, the _cotton gin_ was invented, and an unparalleled impulse given to the cultivation of cotton."
• "_A cotton and silk umbrella_ means one umbrella partly cotton and partly silk; _cotton_ and _silk_ modify the same noun -- _umbrella_."
• "-- _A cotton and a silk umbrella_ means two umbrellas -- one cotton and the other silk; the word umbrella is understood after _cotton_."