Library / English Dictionary

LINEN

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

White goods or clothing made with linen cloth

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("linen" is a kind of...):

household linen; white goods (drygoods for household use that are typically made of white cloth)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "linen"):

bath linen (linens for use in the bathroom)

bed linen (linen or cotton articles for a bed (as sheets and pillowcases))

doily; doyley; doyly (a small round piece of linen placed under a dish or bowl)

napery; table linen (linens for the dining table)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A fabric woven with fibers from the flax plant

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("linen" is a kind of...):

cloth; fabric; material; textile (artifact made by weaving or felting or knitting or crocheting natural or synthetic fibers)

Meronyms (substance of "linen"):

flax (fiber of the flax plant that is made into thread and woven into linen fabric)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A high-quality paper made of linen fibers or with a linen finish

Synonyms:

linen; linen paper

Classified under:

Nouns denoting substances

Hypernyms ("linen" is a kind of...):

paper (a material made of cellulose pulp derived mainly from wood or rags or certain grasses)

Credits

 Context examples: 

Yet she was meanly dressed, a coarse blue petticoat and a linen jacket being her only garb; her fair hair was plaited but not adorned: she looked patient yet sad.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Or you might buy new furniture, a rug, linens, tableware, or other elements to add to your home.

(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)

Mrs. Crupp was to find linen, and to cook; every other necessary was already provided; and Mrs. Crupp expressly intimated that she should always yearn towards me as a son.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

An inventory of linen, in coarse and modern characters, seemed all that was before her!

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

I knew where to find in my drawers some linen, a locket, a ring.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

The tomb contains a mummy wrapped in linen, clay vessels, a collection of about 450 statues, and painted wooden funerary masks.

(Discovery of Two Tombs Dating Back 3,500 Years Announced in Egypt, VOA)

Then our driver, whose wide linen drawers covered the whole front of the box-seat—gotza they call them—cracked his big whip over his four small horses, which ran abreast, and we set off on our journey.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

"Dirty linen," he rumbled.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Twice a week they had to put through hotel linen,—the sheets, pillow-slips, spreads, table-cloths, and napkins.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

I take only the money in a linen bag, and the box of rose colored sugar which is a gift from my captain to the Lady Loring.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)