▪ I. matted, ppl. a.1
(ˈmætɪd)
[f. mat v.2 + -ed1.]
Dulled, deprived of lustre or gloss. (See senses of the vb.)
| 1823 Rutter Fonthill 15 Lights glazed with matted glass in lozenge lattice. 1865 Price List of Joinery 8 Front Doors..glazed with matted glass. 1884 F. J. Britten Watch & Clockm. 173 The granular surface formed on watch plates and wheels prior to gilding is spoken of indifferently as matted or frosted. 1899 Westm. Gaz. 27 June 1/3 A fine silver-gilt Jacobean goblet..with foliage and cone ornament on matted ground. |
▪ II. matted, ppl. a.2
(ˈmætɪd)
[f. mat v.1 + -ed1.]
1. Laid or spread with matting or mats.
| 1607 Middleton Fam. Love iv. i. 116 Like a horsekeeper in a lady's matted chamber at midnight. 1712 Steele Spect. No. 429 ¶12 He has chosen an Apartment with a matted Anti-chamber. 1852 Dickens Bleak Ho. i, The various solicitors..ranged in a line, in a long matted well. 1883 Stevenson Treas. Isl. vi, The servant led us down a matted passage. |
b. Formed of mats as a covering.
| 1720 De Foe Capt. Singleton viii. (1840) 141 We pitched our matted tents. 1841 J. L. Stephens Centr. Amer. II. iii. 47 The little matted tents of the market-women. |
c. Made of plaited rushes. Of chairs, etc.: Rush-bottomed.
| 1692 Dryden Cleomenes Prol. 6 Who..print our matted seats with dirty feet. 1720 Lond. Gaz. No. 5891/4 Tho. Smith, Citizen and Turner, of that Branch called a matted Chair-maker, is in want of Journeymen..either for Matting, Turning, Joining or Carving, in the said matted Chair business... Tho. Smith maketh..all sorts of matted Work, and fine mimick Wallnut-Tree. 1745 De Foe's Eng. Tradesman xxvi. (1841) I. 266 The ordinary matted chairs. 1777 W. Dalrymple Trav. Sp. & Port. xv, We find..matted bottom chairs, in their principal rooms. 1833 Loudon Encycl. Cottage Archit. §2145 A child's chair..having..a matted seat. |
2. Of vegetable growths, also of hair or other fibre: Tangled and interlaced, or covered with tangle.
| 1613 Purchas Pilgrimage (1614) 696 The places in their Winter..covered with water, doe grow thicke and matted with abundance of little trees, herbes and plants. 1661 K. W. Conf. Charac., High Constable (1860) 36 His matted noddle is so stuft with the windy conceit of his mastership, that [etc.]. 1683 Moxon Mech. Exerc., Printing xxiv. ¶19 [He] Teizes his Wooll, by opening all the hard and almost matted Knots he finds in it. 1697 Dryden Virg. Past. iv. 36 Through the Matted Grass the liquid Gold shall creep. 1745 Collins Ode Death Col. Ross vii, Her matted tresses madly spread. 1749 Warton Tri. Isis 57 Cam meandering thro' the matted reeds. 1770 Goldsm. Des. Vill. 349 Those matted woods, where birds forget to sing. 1832 Lytton Eugene A. i. vi, The grass sprung up long and matted. 1865 Dickens Mut. Fr. i. i, Half savage as the man showed, with no covering on his matted head. 1877 Black Green Past. xlii, The matted underwood and the rank green grass. |
b. In names of plants, as matted pink, matted thrift.
| 1625 Bacon Ess., Gardens (Arb.) 558 Then Pincks, specially the Matted Pinck, and Cloue Gilly-flower. 1678 Phillips, Matted, an Epithete given to Plants when they grow, as if they were platted together, as Matted Pink, Matweed, &c. 1706 London & Wise Retir'd Gard'ner I. xxi. 98 Matted Pink. 1861 Miss Pratt Flower. Pl. IV. 254 Matted Thrift. |
c. Compressed into the semblance of a mat.
| 1825 Greenhouse Comp. I. 168 Loosen the earth and matted roots. 1831 Willis Poem Brown University 175 Tender moss, and matted forest leaves. 1845 Florist's Jrnl. 148 The roots are very apt to get matted in the pots. 1849 Murchison Siluria xii. 295 Such Lower Coal..had been often transported in large matted masses from the mouths of great rivers. |
d. Covered with a dense growth.
| 1791 E. Darwin Bot. Gard. i. 79 By thee the plowshare rends the matted plain. 1818 Keats Endym. i. 151 His eye Steadfast upon the matted turf he kept. 1877 Bryant Song of Sower iv, The matted sward. 1881 M. Arnold Westm. Abbey ii, That new Minster in the matted fen. |
e. Path.
| 1897 Allbutt's Syst. Med. IV. 121 The ascitic fluid is sometimes loculated between the matted intestines. 1899 Ibid. VI. 10 The matted valves may remain rigidly fixed. |
3. Enclosed or wrapped in matting. Also with up.
| 1758 Gray Let. 2 Dec. Wks. (1884) II. 388 A wainscot Chest of Drawers, matted up. Ibid., If the matted things fright you on the same account [sc. the danger of fire], the coverings may be taken off, and laid by in some dry place. 1798 Hull Advertiser 15 Dec. 2/1 For Sale,..10 tons Riga matted flax. 1812 J. Smyth Pract. of Customs (1821) 86 Flax... In Matted Bales, with thick ropes. 1855 Mrs. Gaskell North & S. xxvii, The matted-up currant bushes..at the corner of the west-wall. |
Hence ˈmattedly adv., in a matted manner.
| 1894 Du Maurier Trilby I. 87 More greasily, mattedly unkempt than even a successful pianist has any right to be. |