Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The dense, soft, often curly hair forming the coat of sheep and certain other mammals, such as the goat and alpaca, consisting of cylindrical fibers of keratin covered by minute overlapping scales and much valued as a textile fabric.
- n. A material or garment made of this hair.
- n. The furry hair of some insect larvae, such as the caterpillar.
- n. A filamentous or fibrous covering or substance suggestive of the texture of true wool.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. See the extract.
- n. The fine, soft, curly hair which forms the fleece or fleecy coat of the sheep and some other animals, as the goat and alpaca, in fineness approaching fur. The wool or fleece of the sheep furnishes the most important material for clothing in all cold and temperate climates. The felting property from which wool derives its chief value, and which is its special distinction from hair, depends in part upon the kinks in the shaft or fiber, but mainly upon the scales with which the surface is imbricated. These scales are minute, from about 2,000 to nearly 4,000 to the inch, and whorled about the stem in verticils; the stem itself is extremely slender, being less than one thousandth of an inch in diameter. Wool is kept soft and pliable by the wool-oil, commonly called
yolk . In different animals wool shades by imperceptible degrees into hair; and that of the sheep simply represents an extreme case of the most desirable qualities', namely, fineness, kinkiness, and scaliness of the fiber, together with its length, strength, and luster, and the copiousness of the fleece, which consists entirely of wool, without hair; in all of which particulars the wool of the different breeds of sheep varies to a degree. (Compare def. 2.) Wool when shorn is divided into two classes, short wool, or carding-wool, seldom exceeding a length of 3 or 4 inches, and long wool, or combing-wool, varying in length from 4 to 8 inches, each class being subdivided into a variety of sorts, according to the fineness and soundness of the staple. The finest wools are of short staple, and the coarser wools usually of long staple. Wools which unite a high degree of fineness and softness with considerable length of staple bear a high price. English-bred sheep produce a good, strong combing-wool, that of the Scotch breeds being somewhat harsher and coarser. The finest carding-wools were formerly exclusively obtained from Spain, the native country of the merino sheep, and at a later period extensively from Germany, where that breed had been successfully introduced and cultivated. Immense flocks of merinos are now reared in Australia, North and South America, and South Africa. - n. The fine, short, thick underfur or down of any animal, as distinguished from the longer and stiffer hairs which come to the surface of the pelage. Most hairy animals have at least two coats, one of long and comparatively straight, stout, stiff hairs, the other of wool. See
underfur . - n. The short, crisp, curly or kinky hair of the head of some persons, as negroes; humorously, the hair of any person's head.
- n. Any light, downy, fleecy, or flocculent sub stance resembling wool. The dense furry or woolly coat of many insects, as the pubescence covering the moths known as millers, that on various caterpillars', that spun by various larvæ for a case or cocoon, etc. Secretions of various insects are very nicely graded from a solid waxy consistency through various frothy states to a light dry fleecy condition resembling wool: see wax-insect, spittle-insect, and woolly aphis (under woolly). In another large class of cases the spun-out secretion is gossamer, cobweb, or true silk. See these words, and silkworm.
- To pull the hair of, in sport or anger; rumple or tousle the hair of.
Wiktionary
- n. The hair of the sheep, llama and some other ruminants.
- n. A cloth or yarn made from the wool of sheep.
- n. Anything with a texture like that of wool.
- adj. this sense?) Made of wool.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The soft and curled, or crisped, species of hair which grows on sheep and some other animals, and which in fineness sometimes approaches to fur; -- chiefly applied to the fleecy coat of the sheep, which constitutes a most essential material of clothing in all cold and temperate climates.
- n. Short, thick hair, especially when crisped or curled.
- n. (Bot.) A sort of pubescence, or a clothing of dense, curling hairs on the surface of certain plants.
WordNet 3.0
- n. fiber sheared from animals (such as sheep) and twisted into yarn for weaving
- n. a fabric made from the hair of sheep
- n. outer coat of especially sheep and yaks
Etymologies
- Middle English wolle, from Old English wull, from Proto-Germanic *wullō (cf. Dutch wol, German Wolle, Norwegian ull), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂wĺ̥h₁neh₂ (cf. Welsh gwlân, Latin lāna, Lithuanian vìlna, Russian волос (volоs), Bulgarian влас (vlas), Albanian lesh ("wool, hair, fleece")). (Wiktionary)
- Middle English wolle, from Old English wull. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“England as to run wool to France, our ladies, by making use of wool as part of their head-dresses [_lets down the tail and takes out the wool_], keep it at home, and encourage the woollen manufactory.”
“Especially as one of the shiny bits that was carded into the wool is a metallic yarn wrapped over a core of something else.”
“These people are coming in from all over the state, what we call the wool hat boys.”
“This wool is an important thing to our Scottish farmers and it is also important to you business men here in Canada, because if we in Great Britain have no market for our wool we cannot buy the modern agricultural implements which you manufacture.”
“The world of commerce infused his secret war on slavery, which he called his "wool business," funded with venture capital from Northern industrialists.”
“In many instances the authors also include a section on the techniques used by the artist, which variously includes the sourcing of raw materials such as wool from the Mixteca region of the state for making rugs and wall hangings, or clays from other regions of the state for changing tone and texture of sculptures; and processing methods including the extracting of natural dyes from fruits, plants, soils and the cochineal insect.”
Mexican Folk Art from Oaxacan Artist Families by Arden Aibel and Anya Leah Rothstein
“I was brought up in the cattle country of Dakota, although I was born in Manitoba (my parents moved across the line when I was young) and I know the wild cattle and horses there were less manageable than the undomesticated musk-ox; and I know from watching my mother work wool, and helping her work wool, - we were very poor, and my mother used to knit socks to sell them-I know the wool is as good as any wool.”
“Â On top of that was some trimmed origami paper, then a square of felted wool from a sweater that I adored until the moths ate it (and it got washed – hence, felted.)”
“The wool from the sheep kept the textile mills, one of New England's primary industries in the 1800s, at full capacity as the fiber was transformed into garments.”
The Washington Post: Dry-stone walls last for generations, require some engineering
“For example, to present an OLS regression via Bayesian estimation makes them suspicious that the wool is being pulled over their eyes, rather than it just being a philosophical difference in what data can tell us.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘wool’.
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Olde Englisc
English words of Anglo-Saxon origin.
onslaught, slain, clove, clave, thrice, nincompoop, scorn, storm, scant, lurk, beneath, atop and 143 more...
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CULI - wine-tasting adjectives
In this area of expertise nouns are frequently used as adjectives (almond, bacon, cider, diesel, fennel, fresh-cut hay, wool) or new adjectives are formed (appley, berrylike, citrusy, full-bodied, ...
acetic, acidic, aged, angular, appley, astringent, attractive, austere, berrylike, big, bitter, brawny and 511 more...
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IMCO - EU nomenclature
includes words of the "Prodcom list"
abaca, abdominal, abrasive, absorbent, absorber, accelerator, accessory, account book, accumulator, acebutolol, acetaldehyde, acetamide and 4515 more...
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RELI - words with Biblical connotations
Words in the Bible evoking biblical stories or with special spiritual meaning. Proper names have been reduced to the minimum.
ark, judgement, holy, saint, baptism, spirit, love, eternal, altar, balsam, covenant, flood and 1115 more...
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Open List: Sheepishness
Everything sheep, from Artiodactyla to zodiac.
lanolin, ram, ewe, Artiodactyla, even-toed ungulate, ruminant, Ovis aries, ovine, domestic, domesticated, neotenic, mouflon and 426 more...
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Itchy
wool, cat dander, ragweed, poison ivy, dust mite, poison oak, nettles, pollen, mosquito bite, chigger, dog dander, pet dander and 39 more...
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Walking in the snow
If you like piña coladas and getting caught in the rain, I would suggest this other list.
snow, snotsicle, scarf, snowsuit, mittens, gloves, hat, layers, boots, eyelashes freezin..., chemical heat pack, coveralls and 31 more...
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Polymers
"Any of numerous natural and synthetic compounds of usually high molecular weight consisting of up to millions of repeated linked units, each a relatively light and simple molecule."
-...cellulose, diamond, feldspar, nucleic acids, proteins, quartz, rubber, starch, wool, polyethylene, polypropylene, laminarin and 58 more...
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Double Letter words
Here is a list of Double Letter Words! Everyone is welcome to add some more words if needed!
bubbles, gallop, wheel, follow, grasshopper, bunny, rabbit, summer, groovy, puppy, fitness, greetings and 65 more...
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Spinning
This list is basically an excuse for me to list the word wool four times in a row.
wool, spin, spinning, cotton, scribble, scribbler, scribbling, spindle whorl, spindlewhorl, card, card-clothing, carding-machine and 68 more...
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window dressing
chemise, gossamer, tweed, pleat, fold, cuff, button, shirttails, ascot, cummerbund, velvet, silk and 104 more...
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Animals (besides pottos)
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robin, wagtail, frog, bunny, pronk, rabbit, fur, badger, mouse, bee, crepuscular, purr and 140 more...
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thing
apron, lard, clove, camphor, alfalfa, amber, caraway, juniper, kohl, lute, shale, glyph and 142 more...
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to acquire
moustache, thoughtcrime, lift, overall, razor, strength, oily, gin, oily gin, brotherhood, dull, toward and 108 more...
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Weaverly Words
Words that relate to, or come from, the weaving trade.
Weave, Warp, Weft, Loom, Weaver, Weaving, woven, handwoven, twill, tabby, plainweave, sleazy and 95 more...
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my dictionary
able, abnormally, abroad, absent, abstract, acceptable, acceptance, access, accessible, accession, according to, account and 4551 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for wool.

yarb "The strychnine - he had ironically put some ice in it - tasted sweet, rather like cassis; it provided a species of subliminal stimulus, faintly perceived: the Consul, who was still standing, was aware too of a faint feeble wooling of his pain..."
- Lowry, Under the Volcano Jun 25, 2011