English▸ noun
(plural tabbies)
1 (also tabby cat) a cat whose fur is mottled or streaked with dark stripes.
▪ US informal any domestic cat.
4 a type of concrete made of lime, shells, gravel, and stones, which dries very hard.
[early 19th century (originally tabby work): perhaps a different word, or from a resemblance in colour to that of a tabby cat.]
▸ adjective (of a cat) gray or brownish in color and streaked with dark stripes:
a young tabby tomcat.
– ORIGIN late 16th century (denoting a kind of silk taffeta, originally striped, later with a watered finish: see tabby (SENSE 2 OF THE noun)): from French tabis, based on Arabic al-‘Attābiyya, the name of the quarter of Baghdad where tabby was manufactured.