coxcomb - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

A rooster with a large red coxcomb. (2)

From Middle English cokke ’s comb.

coxcomb (plural coxcombs)

  1. (historical) The cap of a court jester, adorned with a red stripe.
  2. The fleshy red pate of a rooster.
  3. (by extension) A foolish or conceited person; a dandy.
    Synonyms: fool, popinjay
    • a. 1746, Jonathan Swift, “VII. Another, Written upon a Window where there was No Writing before.”, in Thomas Sheridan, compiler, The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, D.D., Dean of St. Patrick’s, Dublin. […] In Nineteen Volumes, new corrected and revised edition, volume VII, London: Printed [by Nichols and Son] for J[oseph] Johnson [_et al._], published 1801, →OCLC, page 361:
      Thanks to my stars, I once can see / A window here from scribbling free! / Here no conceited coxcombs pass, / To scratch their paltry drabs on glass; / Nor party-fool is calling names, / Or dealing crowns to George and James.
    • 1749, Henry Fielding, chapter XIII, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume III, London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, book VII, page 112:
      [F]or tho' I am afraid the Doctor was a little of a Coxcomb, he might be nevertheleſs very much of a Surgeon.

pate of a rooster

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