tissue

From Old French tissu, past participle of tistre, from Latin texere.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈtɪʃu/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈtɪsjuː/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈtɪʃu/

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• Rhymes: -ɪsjuː, -ɪʃuː

tissue (countable and uncountable, plural tissues)

1. Thin, woven, gauze-like fabric.
   • 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 17, in The China Governess‎:

     The face which emerged was not reassuring. It was blunt and grey, the nose springing thick and flat from high on the frontal bone of the forehead, whilst his eyes were narrow slits of dark in a tight bandage of tissue. […].

2. A fine transparent silk material, used for veils, etc.; specifically, cloth interwoven with gold or silver threads, or embossed with figures.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Dryden

     a robe of tissue, stiff with golden wire

   • (Can we date this quote?) John Milton

     In their glittering tissues bear emblazed / Holy memorials.

3. A sheet of absorbent paper, especially one that is made to be used as tissue paper, toilet paper or a handkerchief.
4. Absorbent paper as material.
5. (biology) A group of cells similar in origin that function together to do a specific job.
   • 2014, Robert K. Bolger, Scott Korb, "Gesturing Toward Reality: David Foster Wallace and Philosophy

     "What they lack is outermost brain tissue that, at least in humans, prompts awareness and interpretation."

6. Web; texture; complicated fabrication; connected series.

   a tissue of forgeries, or of lies

   • (Can we date this quote?) A. J. Balfour

     unwilling to leave the dry bones of Agnosticism wholly unclothed with any living tissue of religious emotion

tissue (third-person singular simple present tissues, present participle tissuing, simple past and past participle tissued)

1. To form tissue of; to interweave.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Francis Bacon

     Covered with cloth of gold tissued upon blue.

• Eustis, suites