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doff

[dof, dawf]
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verb (used with object)
  1. to remove or take off, as clothing.
  2. to remove or tip (the hat), as in greeting.
  3. to throw off; get rid of: Doff your stupid ideas and join our side!
  4. Textiles.
    1. to strip (carded fiber) from a carding machine.
    2. to remove (full bobbins, material, etc.) from a textile machine.
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noun
  1. Textiles.
    1. the act of removing bobbins, material, etc., and stripping fibers from a textile machine.
    2. the material so doffed.
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Origin of doff

1300–50; Middle English, contraction of do off; cf. don1
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Examples from the Web for doffing

Historical Examples

  • He bowed to her with a grave courtesy, doffing his hat and casting it upon a chair.

    The Sea-Hawk

    Raphael Sabatini

  • He rose as she drew nigh, and, doffing his hat, made shift to pass on.

    The Tavern Knight

    Rafael Sabatini

  • It was as though with the doffing of the motley she had discarded its recollections.

    Under the Rose

    Frederic Stewart Isham

  • "I offer me congratulations," he said, doffing his cap and bowing low.

    Klondike Nuggets

    E. S. Ellis

  • I could not, were my very life at stake, think of affronting them by not doffing my hat.

    The Disowned, Complete

    Edward Bulwer-Lytton

British Dictionary definitions for doffing

doff

verb (tr)
  1. to take off or lift (one's hat) in salutation
  2. to remove (clothing)
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Derived Formsdoffer, noun

Word Origin

Old English dōn of; see do 1, off; compare don 1
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for doffing

doff

v.

mid-14c., contraction of do off, preserving the original sense of do as "put." At the time of Johnson's Dictionary [1755] the word was "obsolete, and rarely used except by rustics," but it was saved from extinction (along with don) by Sir Walter Scott. Related: Doffed; doffing.

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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper