: a cement made of lime, sand or gravel, and oyster shells and used chiefly along the coast of Georgia and South Carolina in the 17th and 18th centuries
Examples of tabby in a Sentence
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Noun
Saffron Breed: Domestic shorthair/tabby Age: 1 year Meet a young kitty with soft stripes, a quiet spirit and a growing curiosity about the world around him.—Trish Stinger, Kansas City Star, 18 June 2025 Other genes then act as modifiers, leading to color dilution, white patches, tabby pattern, and more.—Maria Azzurra Volpe, MSNBC Newsweek, 16 June 2025
Adjective
This little purr machine is Fernando, a 3-year-old tabby cat with soft stripes, a gentle heart and a shy soul.—Trish Stinger, Kansas City Star, 25 June 2025 But inside was the couple's 12-year-old tabby cat, who survived the 380-foot fall, according to Best Friends Animal Society, the animal rescue organization that took her in.—Julia Jacobo, ABC News, 30 May 2025 See All Example Sentences for tabby
Word History
Etymology
Noun (1)
French tabis, from Middle French atabis, from Medieval Latin attabi, from Arabic ʽattābī, from Al-ʽAttābīya, quarter in Baghdad
Noun (2)
Gullah tabi, ultimately from Spanish tapia adobe wall
from French tabis "a silk fabric with a lustrous wavy finish," from Latin attabi (same meaning), from Arabic 'attābī (same meaning), from Al-'Attābīya, name of a part of Baghdad where the cloth was made
Word Origin
A silk cloth with a striped or wavy pattern was once made in a section of the ancient city of Baghdad in what is now Iraq. The Arabic name for the cloth was 'attābī, from Al-'Attābīya, the name of the part of the city where it was made. Through Latin, the French borrowed this word for the cloth, calling it tabis. This word in turn became tabby in English. People saw a resemblance between the striped or wavy pattern of the silk and cats that had striped or spotted markings on their fur. Thus these cats came to be called tabby cats after the cloth.
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