clothes

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English clothes, the plural of cloth,^[2][3] inherited from Old English clāþas,^[4][5][3] the plural of clāþ (“cloth, article of clothing”).^[4][5][6][7] The ō stayed long in the originally open syllable, and the consonant between the vowels was voiced, then the ending -s became a z sound.^[3] The singular cloth then lost the sense "garment" and took a new plural, cloths, for its other senses, so that clothes was left as a collective plural with no singular.^[3][8] The Old English noun goes back to Proto-Germanic *klaiþą,^[1] reconstructed as *klaithaz by Barnhart^[9] and *kalithaz by Etymonline,^[8] with cognates in Dutch kleed and German Kleid.^[10][11] Its ultimate origin is unknown,^[12][7][3] though some connect it with clīþan (“to adhere”).^[5][11][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Things worn to cover the body, garments: already in Old English,^[3][13] in King Alfred's translation of Boethius,^[3] and before 900 in Dictionary.com.^[10] Barnhart gives the underlying singular, in the same sense, before 800.^[9]

Semantic evolution

Old English applied clāþ to a piece of fabric and to fabric in general, and in the plural to garments,^[14] and Chaucer's and Gower's clothes are entered under the same noun in Benson's concordance.^[15] The sense soon narrowed to particular sets of things: swaddling-clothes by about 1340, in Rolle,^[3] and bedclothes by 1400.^[3] From 1398 it is also the laundry, things that have to be washed or have just been.^[3] Johnson (1755) still gives cloths or clothes as the plural of cloth.^[16] The two plurals began to divide about 1600, but the complete distinction dates from the 19th century,^[3][8] and the usual 18th-century spelling was cloaths, for both.^[3] Figurative use, as a role or outward style, has a precedent in the OED's 1649 to be in a person's clothes, to be in that person's place,^[3] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged records both senses as current.^[5] American slang shortened plain clothes to in clothes, working as a detective, by 1973.^[17]

Timeline

• before 900 – garments, articles worn on the body.^[10][3]
• c. 1340 – swaddling-clothes.^[3]
• 1398 – items to be washed or just washed, laundry.^[3]
• before 1400 – bedclothes.^[3]
• 1649 – to be in a person's clothes, to be in that person's place (obsolete).^[3]
• 1860 – the compound clothes-hanger.^[8]
• 1973 – US slang in clothes, working as a detective.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. Things worn to cover the body; garments, attire: She packed warm clothes for the hike.^[6][5][3]
2. (chiefly British) Bedclothes.^[6][5][3]
3. Cloth articles for personal and household use that can be washed; laundry: He hung the clothes out on Saturdays.^[5][3]
4. A distinctive outward style; guise: an old argument in new clothes.^[5]
5. A character or role: stepping into the clothes of her predecessor.^[5]
6. (obsolete, Middle English to mid-18th century) Swaddling clothes.^[3][13]

Word family

• bedclothes
• clothesbasket
• clotheshorse
• clothesline
• playclothes
• clothes-peg
• clothespin
• clothespress

Related words

• cloth
• clothe
• clothing
• clothier

Usage notes

Because the th is usually lost in speech, the word is pronounced like close as well as with its th: Merriam-Webster Unabridged puts the form without it first,^[5] and Webster (1828) recorded only that form.^[18] The OED calls that pronunciation nonstandard and notes that spellings such as close and cloes go back to Middle English.^[3] The Scots and northern form is claes.^[13][3] There is no singular: an expression such as article of clothing, or a word such as garment, fills the gap.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
7. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
9. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
10. ^ a b c Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
12. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
13. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
14. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
15. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
16. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
17. ^ a b Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
18. ^ Webster, Noah (1828), An American Dictionary of the English Language, New York: S. Converse