gossamer
Americannoun
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a fine, filmy cobweb seen on grass or bushes or floating in the air in calm weather, especially in autumn.
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a thread or strand of a filmy cobweb seen outdoors.
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an extremely delicate variety of gauze, used especially for veils.
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any thin, light fabric.
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something extremely light, flimsy, or delicate.
The viper appeared to be midway through sloughing off its skin, half covered as it was with a thin gossamer of its former outer self.
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a thin, waterproof outer garment, especially for women, popular in the late 19th century.
adjective
noun
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a gauze or silk fabric of the very finest texture
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a filmy cobweb often seen on foliage or floating in the air
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anything resembling gossamer in fineness or filminess
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(modifier) made of or resembling gossamer
gossamer wings
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of gossamer
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English gos(s)esomer, gossummer “filmy substance made of cobwebs; fine filament; something trivial”; possibly first used as a name for late, mild autumn, a time when goose was a favorite dish (compare German Gänsemonat “November”), then transferred to the cobwebs frequent at that time of year
Explanation
Gossamer is something super fine and delicate — like a spider web or the material of a wedding veil. The original gossamer, from which these meanings come from, is the fine, filmy substance spiders excrete to weave their webs. A dress can be gossamer-like, if its fabric is so sheer as to be see-through, or almost. Your chances of going to a good college are "gossamer thin" if you've never cracked a book in high school.
Vocabulary lists containing gossamer
The Hunger Games
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100 SAT Words Beginning with "G"
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"The Pit and the Pendulum" by Edgar Allan Poe
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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.
Billie Eilish's gossamer ballad Birds of a Feather is a similar masterclass in songcraft - making this category one of the hardest to predict.
From BBC ● Jan. 31, 2025
Oppenheimer, who speaks almost professorially in a gentle, gossamer voice, took his own idea seriously, feeling the theme he wanted to explore dictated a sung approach.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 5, 2024
Princeton researchers have learned to harness the gossamer scaffolding that maintains the structure of living cells and used it to develop a nanotechnology platform.
From Science Daily ● Jan. 25, 2024
For the final ceremony of the multiday celebrations, Arti wore a full velvet skirt covered in golden embroidery, matched to the gossamer red veil over her head.
From New York Times ● Dec. 8, 2023
Out in the sunlight the air was balmy, and through skies of palest sapphire sailed clouds of gossamer silk.
From "In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson" by Bette Bao Lord
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.
