Also swan’s-skin. [Cf. Sw. svanskinn.]
1. The skin of a swan (with the feathers on); transf. a soft or delicate skin.
1610. [see 3].
1842. Penny Cycl., XXIII. 375/2. Cygnus Buccinator,… to which the bulk of the swan-skins imported by the Hudson’s Bay Company belong.
1846. J. E. Taylor, Fairy Ring, Six Swans, 66. The swans flew to her,… their swans’ skins fell off, and her brothers stood before her in their natural form.
2. A fine thick kind of flannel; also, a woollen blanketing used by printers and engravers as an elastic impression-surface.
1694. Motteux, Rabelais, V. Pantagr. Prognost., x. 246. Furr’d Gowns, Swans-Skins, and other warm Cloths.
1706. Phillips (ed. Kersey), Swans-skin, a sort of fine Flannel, so call’d on account of its extraordinary Whiteness.
1844. Ladies’ Hand-bk. Haberdashery, 31. Swanskin is … especially employed by the laundress, as a covering for her tables.
1863. Alpine Jrnl., March, 27. Very stout and dense scarlet blanketing (of the description known to the trade as swanskin).
3. attrib. Made or consisting of swanskin. Swanskin flannel = sense 2.
1610. B. Jonson, Alch., III. iii. I’ the swan-skin couerlid, and cambrick sheets.
1740. Richardson, Pamela (1824), I. xx. 32. I bought two flannel undercoats; not so good as my swanskin and fine linen ones.
c. 1790. Imison, Sch. Arts, II. 49. Directions for laying the Mezzotinto Ground…. Laying your plate with a piece of swanskin-flannel under it, upon your table.
1904. W. Churchill, Crossing, I. vi. 64. He wore jauntily a swanskin three-cornered hat.
