Linenlike

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Having the appearance, texture or smooth crisp feel of woven linen cloth
2. Resembling the plain, slightly rough and crisp quality associated with fabric made from flax
3. Looking or feeling like linen, the fine woven cloth traditionally made from flax fibres

Etymology: Linenlike is about as transparent as English compounds get: it joins "linen", the cloth woven from flax fibres, to the suffix "-like", which means "resembling" or "having the qualities of" whatever comes before it. So a linenlike thing is one that looks or feels like linen, whether it is a smooth, crisp texture or a woven pattern. The base word has an older and more surprising history than the cloth itself. "Linen" comes from the Old English "linen", an adjective meaning "made of flax", which is related to "lin", the Old English word for the flax plant. The "-like" suffix is equally old in English, descending from the Old English "-lic", the source of words such as "lovely" and "godly". By the time "-like" was attached to "linen", it was a productive ending that English speakers could add to almost any noun to describe resemblance.