mattress

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“
I slept well except that it got really cold in the middle of the night in the desert, so the thick comforter that I had used as a mattress was then actually used as a comforter after that, for warmth.

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Definitions (12)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (4)

  1. noun A usually rectangular pad of heavy cloth filled with soft material or an arrangement of coiled springs, used as or on a bed.
  2. noun An airtight inflatable pad used as or on a bed or as a cushion.
  3. noun A closely woven mat of brush and poles used to protect an embankment, a dike, or a dam from erosion.
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Examples (45)

  • He was cushioned by the shock-mattress, all right, but if he could barely tolerate full grav, blastoff would rack him with pain. —  The Ship Who Sang
  • Its canopy was carved of gonda wood and hung with brocade, and the mattress was at the level of her shoulders. —  Trillium 05 - Lady of the Trillium by Marion Zimmer Bradley (v1.0) (html).html
  • Sleepless, I had given myself over to imaginings: my mattress was a flat expanse of rock atop an alien plateau; the bedclothes, a range of hills, cave-riddled, with nameless things lying half-awake, half-aware, beneath; the floor of my room, a vast expanse of desert plain, flat and red and empty to the horizon of the far wall. —  BlackStaticHorrorMagazine#3
  • I'm definitely recommending to my father-in-law, that should he need to get his daughter a gift, that a mattress might be a good idea. —  Knit & Purl Mama
  • The increasing uncertainty surrounding a number of banks and building societies has left a number of savers wondering if under their mattress is the best place for their money! —  Find Free Articles - ArticlesBase
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Etymologies (2)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English mattresse, from Old French materas, from Old Italian materasso and from Medieval Latin matracium, both from Arabic maṭraḥ, place where something is thrown, mat, cushion, from ṭaraḥa, to throw; see ṭrḥ in Semitic roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. Formerly also matress, mattrass, matteress; from Middle English mattress, matrys, matras = Dutch matras = Swedish madrass = Danish madras, from Old French materas, French matelas = Italian materasso, materassa = Middle High German matraz, materaz, German matratze, from Middle Latin matratum, mataratium, mataritium = (with Arabic art.) Spanish almadraque = Portuguese almatrac, a mattress, from Arabic matrah, mattress, cushion, bed, properly a place where anything is thrown, then something thrown down, hence a ‘shake-down,’ a mattress, from taraha, throw down.
 

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/ˈmætrɛs/
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