Other forms: tufts
A tuft is a small bunch of hairs or grass growing together. A tuft of grass, tufts of hair, a tufted duck.
The growing together is what makes it a tuft rather than a handful — the hairs share a root or a base. Tufted furniture is buttoned so the stuffing cannot shift, and the name comes from the same image.
1nountuftA small bunch of hairs or grass growing together.
“A tuft of grass grew between the paving stones.”
tuft is a bunch.
Middle English tuft comes from Old French touffe, a tuft, probably from a Germanic source.
Latin
tūfa — helmet crest
Old French
touffe
Middle English
tuft
English, today
tuft
Built from
From Middle English tuft, toft, tofte, an alteration of earlier tuffe (> Modern English tuff), from Old French touffe, tuffe, toffe, tofe (“tuft”) (modern French touffe), from Latin tūfa (“helmet crest”) (near Vegezio). Compare Old English þūf (“tuft”), Old Norse þúfa (“mound”), Swedish tuva (“tussock; grassy hillock”), Swedish tova (“tangled knot”), Swedish tofs (“tuft, tassel”), from Proto-Germanic þūbǭ (“tube”), þūbaz; akin to Latin tūber (“hump, swelling”), Ancient Greek τῡ́φη (“cattail (used to stuff beds)”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA