verb
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to dress or attire (a person)
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to provide with clothing or covering
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to conceal or disguise
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to endow or invest
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of clothe
before 950; Middle English clothen, Old English clāthian, derivative of clāth cloth
Explanation
To clothe someone is to give them something to wear, or to dress them in clothing. If you clothe your dog in cute outfits, you may traumatize him for life. You can clothe yourself, or someone else — for example, you might clothe yourself in black for a relative's funeral or clothe yourself in sequins and feathers for the school dance. You can also figuratively clothe someone or something, lending them a sense of power or respectability. Clothe shares a root with clothing and cloth, the Old English claþ, "cloth or sail," and also "woven material to wrap around oneself."
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“If I have money, I can dream of many things. But if I have no money, how do we eat? How do we clothe ourselves? Where would we live?”
From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 11, 2026
I take the injunction to welcome the stranger and to feed and clothe very seriously.
From BBC • Oct. 30, 2024
“Not only is food very expensive, but school supplies have also doubled in price. I also have to clothe my children and, above all, deal with their illnesses,” the 65-year-old said.
From Seattle Times • Oct. 25, 2023
“He clothed my children where I couldn’t clothe them. He fed them where I couldn’t … Not a penny left my pocket.”
From Washington Times • May 25, 2023
Ricky swatted at the gnats that had begun to clothe us.
From "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children" by Ransom Riggs
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
