Past tense of 'gin': either to trap something in a gin (snare), or to remove seeds from cotton using a cotton gin machine.
From 'gin' as a verb, dating to the 16th century. The cotton-processing sense developed in the 18th century after Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin in 1793, though the verb form may predate the machine.
The cotton gin revolutionized textile production but tragically enabled slavery's expansion—the word 'ginned' became tied to an invention that had enormous human and historical consequences.
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