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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

muslin.

Any of several varieties of thin cotton cloth.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈmʌz.lɪn/
  1. Any of several varieties of thin cotton cloth.

    uncountable · usually
  2. Fabric made of cotton, flax (linen), hemp, or silk, finely or coarsely woven.

    US · uncountable · usually
  3. Any of a wide variety of tightly-woven thin fabrics, especially those used for bedlinen.

    uncountable · usually
  4. Woven cotton or linen fabrics, especially when used for items other than garments.

    US · uncountable · usually
  5. A mock-up of a garment pattern made of inexpensive fabric for the purpose of optimizing its fit on the wearer, before the garment is produced in more expensive fabric.

    countable · usually
    Fitting this pattern is tricky, so we recommend you make a muslin first.
  6. Any of several different moths, especially the muslin moth, Diaphora mendica.

    uncountable · usually
  7. Woman as sex object; prostitute, as in a bit of muslin.

    uncountable · usually
Where this word comes from

From French mousseline, from Italian mussolina, from Mussolo (“Mosul”), that is Mosul in northern Iraq (compare 1875 Knight, Edward H., Knight's American Mechanical Dictionary, V2 p1502: "Muslins are so called from Moussol in India."). Doublet of mousseline.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.