homespun

English

Etymology

From home +‎ spun.

Adjective

homespun (not comparable)

  1. (of yarn) Spun in the home.
  2. (of fabric) Woven in the home.
  3. (of clothing, etc.) Made from homespun fabric.
    • 1855–1859, Washington Irving, The Life of George Washington:
      homespun country garbs
    • 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 250:
      He became more and more excited; he rose from the sofa, walked up and down the floor with hurried steps and fought with his hands in the air, till the light flickered hither and thither, while the sweeping tail of his long grey home-spun coat described long circles every time he swung himself round and raised himself on his longer leg, for, like Tyrtaeus and Peter Solvold of our parish, he was afflicted with a limp.
    • 1996 [1994], Andrew Bromfield, transl., The Tambourine of the Upper World, translation of original by Victor Pelevin:
      The woman was dressed in a long broad kaftanlike homespun shirt decorated with thin strips of reindeer fur, leather braiding, small gleaming plates of metal, and lots of little bells which made a rather pleasant melodic sound at every jolt of the train.
  4. (by extension) Plain and homely; unsophisticated and unpretentious.
    Synonyms: down-home, cracker-barrel
    • 1697, Virgil, “(please specify the book number)”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
      our homespun English proverb
    • 1707, Joseph Addison, Prologue to Phaedra and Hippolitus (spoken by Mr. Wilkes, written by Edmund Smith)
      our homespun authors must forsake the field
    • 2008 July 15, Matthew Yglesias, “Obama's Elitism Problem, Continued”, in The Atlantic‎:
      The McCains, by contrast, dole out such homespun wisdom as "in Arizona, the only way to get around the state is by small private plane" and understand that in this crazy modern world where the typical family owns eleven homes and spends hundreds of thousands of dollars per year on household staff, you can't possibly expect transportation alternatives to gain popularity.

Translations

Noun

homespun (countable and uncountable, plural homespuns)

  1. Fabric made from homespun yarn. Also, machine made fabrics (usually cottons) similar to homespun fabrics in that solids, plaids, or stripes are created by weaving dyed threads (rather than printing), so that both sides of the fabric look the same.
    • 1948 August, Aldous Huxley, Ape and Essence, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, →OCLC:
      There are four men, heavily bearded and more than a little dirty, and two young women, all of them busy with shovels in or around an opened grave and all dressed identically in shirts and trousers of tattered homespun.
  2. (obsolete) An unpolished, rustic person.

See also

French

Noun

homespun m (uncountable)

  1. homespun (fabric)

Further reading
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