Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A strong, twilled cotton, traditionally used in making uniforms and work clothes.
  • noun Pants made of jean, denim, or another durable fabric.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Same as jane, 1.
  • noun A twilled cotton cloth, used both for underwear and for outer clothing: commonly, of garments, in the plural. Also written jane.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A twilled cotton cloth.
  • noun Same as blue jeans.
  • noun Pants made of different fabrics, resembling blue jeans.
  • noun a kind of jean woven smooth and glossy, after the manner of satin.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Denim.
  • adjective Made of denim (as "jean jacket").

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun (usually plural) close-fitting trousers of heavy denim for manual work or casual wear
  • noun a coarse durable twill-weave cotton fabric

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Short for obsolete jene fustian, Genoan fustian, from Middle English jene, gene, from Old French Genes, Genoa.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From the Middle English Gene ("Genoa"), from the Old French Jannes. Bleu de Gênes (“Genovese blue”) was a blue dye made in Genoa used to tint the denim cloth produced in Nîmes (de Nîmes).

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word jean.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • Jean by Oliver went to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1969. This is a song from the soundtrack of the film The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and was written by Rod McKuen who also recorded it.

    February 9, 2008

  • Also "Oh Jean," a great (if weird) song by the Proclaimers, and "5 Green Queens & Jean" by the Pogues.

    February 9, 2008