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Cabbage, Not the Vegetable
Does the "filching" meaning of cabbage bring to mind an image of thieves sneaking out of farm fields with armloads of pilfered produce? If so, you're in for a surprise. This use has nothing to do with the leafy vegetable. It originally referred to the practice among tailors of pocketing part of the cloth given to them to make garments. The verb was cut from the same cloth as an older British noun cabbage, which meant "pieces of cloth left in cutting out garments and traditionally kept by tailors as perquisites." Both of those ethically questionable cabbages probably derived from cabas, the Middle French word for "cheating or theft." The cabbage found in coleslaw, on the other hand, comes from Middle English caboche, which meant "head."
Synonyms
Noun (1)
Examples of cabbage in a Sentence
Chloe Berger, Fortune, 30 Oct. 2024
Photo: Dani Benton The ingredients can change, but it is typically shredded cabbage held together with batter, cooked on a hot grill table or teppan.
—Dani Benton, Contributor, CNBC, 29 Oct. 2024
Types of microgreens include broccoli, red cabbage, cauliflower, radishes, beets, basil, parsley, and cilantro.
—Julie Marks, Verywell Health, 29 Oct. 2024
That night’s dinner was cabbage rolls, an Allrecipes number from a user going by Judy.
—Ruby Tandoh, The New Yorker, 28 Sep. 2024
See all Example Sentences for cabbage 
Dictionary Entries Near cabbage
Cite this Entry
“Cabbage.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cabbage. Accessed 28 Nov. 2024.
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