Meaning

noun plug of cotton or other absorbent material; inserted into wound or body cavity to absorb exuded fluids (especially blood)

verb plug with a tampon

originFirst attested in 1848. Borrowed from French tampon, from Middle French tampon, a nasalised variant of tapon, a diminutive or augmented form of Old French tape (“plug, bung, tap”), from Frankish *tappō (“stopper, plug”), from Proto-Germanic *tappô (“plug, tap”). Cognate with Old High German zapfo (“stopper”), Old English tæppa (“stopper”). Doublet of tampion. More at tap.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0