cotton

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The Word of the Day for November 23 is: 

cotton   \KAH-tun\   verb
         *1 : to take a liking -- used with to 
     2 : to come to understand -- used with to or on to

Example sentence:
          It took fans a while to cotton to the changes in the championship 
series, but they now love the new play-off format.

Did you know?
     The noun “cotton” first appeared in English around 700 years ago. It 
comes, via Anglo-French and Old Italian, from the Arabic word for cotton, 
“qutun” or “qutn.” In the 15th century, “cotton” acquired a verb use meaning 
“to form a nap on (cloth).” Though this verb sense is now obsolete, our 
modern-day use might have spun from it. In 1822, English philologist Robert 
Nares reported that “cotton” had been used to mean “to succeed” and speculated 
that this use came from “the finishing of cloth, which when it cottons, or 
rises to a regular nap, is nearly or quite complete.” The meaning of “cotton” 
shifted from “to get on well” to “to get on well together,” and eventually to 
the sense we know today, “to take to.” The “understand” sense appeared later, 
in the early 20th century.





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