Crossword Dictionary

What's The Definition Of Calico?

\Cal"i*co\, n.; pl. {Calicoes}. [So called because first imported from Calicut, in the East Indies: cf. F. calicot.] 1. Plain white cloth made from cotton, but which receives distinctive names according to quality and use, as, super calicoes, shirting calicoes, unbleached calicoes, etc. [Eng.] The importation of printed or stained colicoes appears to have been coeval with the establishment of the East India Company. --Beck (Draper's Dict. ). 2. Cotton cloth printed with a figured pattern. Note: In the United States the term calico is applied only to the printed fabric. {Calico bass} (Zo["o]l.), an edible, fresh-water fish ({Pomoxys sparaides}) of the rivers and lake of the Western United States (esp. of the Misissippi valley.), allied to the sunfishes, and so called from its variegated colors; -- called also {calicoback}, {grass bass}, {strawberry bass}, {barfish}, and {bitterhead}. {Calico printing}, the art or process of impressing the figured patterns on calico.
\Cal"i*co\, a. Made of, or having the appearance of, calico; -- often applied to an animal, as a horse or cat, on whose body are large patches of a color strikingly different from its main color. [Colloq. U. S.]