different between pillowy vs pillow

English

Etymology

From pillow +? -y.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?p?.l??.(w)i/
• Rhymes: -?l??(w)i

Adjective

pillowy (comparative more pillowy, superlative most pillowy)

1. Resembling a pillow: soft and fluffy
   • 2012, Si King, Dave Myers, The Hairy Bikers' Big Book of Baking

     Delectable soft, pillowy rolls, filled with a sweet nutty mixture or fruit, these are like tea cakes and are great for breakfast or tea.

   • 2017, David Friend, The Naughty Nineties:

     Anna Nicole Smith, the pillowy Playboy and Guess jeans model, marries eighty-nine-year-old J. Howard Marshall II, an oil baron six decades her senior, who is worth half a billion dollars.

English

Etymology

From Middle English pilwe, from Old English pylwe, pylu, pyle (“pillow”), from Proto-West Germanic *pulw? (“pillow”), from Latin pulv?nus (“cushion”), derived from pulvis (“dust, powder”) +? -?nus (“-ine”), for the filler of a pillow. Doublet of pulvinus.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?p?l??/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?p?lo?/
• (US, dialectal) IPA^(key): /?p?lo?/
• Rhymes: -?l??

Noun

pillow (countable and uncountable, plural pillows)

1. A soft cushion used to support the head in bed.
   • 2016, VOA Learning English (public domain)

     And it is a pillow!

2. (geology) A pillow lava.
3. (engineering) A piece of metal or wood, forming a support to equalize pressure; a brass; a pillow block.
4. (nautical) A block under the inner end of a bowsprit.
5. The socket of a pivot.
6. (uncountable) A kind of plain, coarse fustian.

Derived terms

Descendants

• ? Maori: pera

Translations

Verb

pillow (third-person singular simple present pillows, present participle pillowing, simple past and past participle pillowed)

1. (transitive) To rest as on a pillow.
   • 1942, Rebecca West, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon (Canongate 2006, p. 815-6)

     She had pillowed her head on her arm.