Tissue comes from Latin texere — 'to weave'. It originally meant rich woven cloth. Biologists borrowed the word for interconnected cells. The same root gives us text, textile, texture, and context.
A group of cells in the body that work together to perform a specific function; a thin, soft piece of paper used for wiping.
From Old French tissu meaning 'a ribbon, a band of woven material', past participle of tistre meaning 'to weave', from Latin texere meaning 'to weave, to fabricate, to construct'. The original meaning was 'woven cloth' — particularly rich, interwoven fabric like cloth of gold. The biological sense of 'body tissue' was coined in the 17th century by analogy: cells interconnected like threads
Tissue, text, and textile all come from the same Latin root texere — 'to weave'. A text is words woven together. A textile is woven fabric. A tissue was originally rich woven cloth, then biologists borrowed it: cells interconnected like threads in fabric. Context is literally 'woven together' — the threads of meaning surrounding a word. Even a pretext is something 'woven in front' to conceal