▪ I. shuttlecock, n.
(ˈʃʌt(ə)lkɒk)
[f. shuttle n.1 (q.v. for forms) + cock n.1 Cf. shuttle-cork.]
1. A small piece of cork, or similar light material, fitted with a crown or circle of feathers, used in the game of ‘battledore and shuttlecock’ (see 2) and also in the game of Badminton.
| 1522 Skelton Why not to Court 351, I trow all wyll be nought, Nat worth a shyttel cocke. 1591 Spenser M. Hubberd 804 A thousand wayes he them could entertaine,..With dice, with cards,..With shuttelcocks. 1599 Nashe Lenten Stuffe 74 This playing with a shettlecocke, or tossing empty bladders in the ayre. 1604 Middleton Ant & Nightingale C 3 b, His head was drest vp in white Feathers like a Shuttle-Cock. 1626 Breton Fantasticks Oct. C 4 b, The shuttel-Cocke with the Battel-doore is a pretty house⁓exercise. 1688 Bunyan Water of Life 116 (end), They toss their Vanities about as the Boys toss their Shittle-Cocks in the Air. 1777 Sheridan Trip to Scarb. Prol., Made up, like shuttlecocks, of cork and feather. 1801 C. K. Sharpe Let. 12 Jan. Corr. 1888 I. 103 With long stiff feathers stuck round their heads like those of a shittle-cock. 1838 Lytton Alice vi. i, Vast interests and solemn causes are no longer tossed about like shuttlecocks on the battledores of empty tongues. 1897 Encycl. Sport I. 70/2 (Badminton) Shuttlecock, the missile employed, which consists of a cork crowned with feathers, from 3 to 5 inches in length. |
b. fig.
| 1602 Dekker Satiromastix F 2 b, What made these paire of Shittle-cockes heere? what doe they fumble for? 1700 T. Brown tr. Fresny's Amusem., Westm. Hall Wks. 1709 III. i. 49 Certain..Sollicitors and Barristers, make it their whole business to keep the Shuttle-cock [Chancery suits] in motion. 1760–72 H. Brooke Fool of Qual. (1809) III. 130 The shittlecock of conversation may fall to the ground. 1858 Duke of Argyll Autobiog. (1906) II. 124 This Reform question ought not to be made the shuttlecock of party. 1884 Pall Mall Gaz. 5 Dec. 5/1 The best American securities are periodically the shuttlecock of unscrupulous speculators. |
2. The game (more fully battledore and shuttlecock, now played only by children) in which the shuttlecock is hit with the battledore backwards and forwards between two players, or by one player into the air as many times as possible without dropping it.
| 1599 B. Jonson Cynthia's Rev. ii. iv, Shee can..play at shittle-cock. 1628 Burton Anat. Mel. ii. ii. iv. (ed. 3) 255 The ordinary recreations which we haue in Winter..are Cardes..shuttlecocke, balliardes [etc.]. 1711 Swift Jrnl. to Stella 20 Sept., And get somebody to play shuttlecock with you, Madam Stella. 1842 S. Lover Handy Andy xiv, Pray Mr. F...are you fond of shuttlecock? |
| fig. 1858 Sears Athan. iii. 20 They were only playing at shuttlecock with words. |
3. A Mexican malvaceous shrub, Periptera punica.
| 1829 Loudon Encycl. Plants 588 Periptera punica. Shuttlecock. 1840 Paxton Bot. Dict. 1866 Treas. Bot. s.v. |
4. attrib. and Comb., as shuttlecock-maker.
| 1628 Ford Love's Mel. i. ii, A shittlecock maker. |
b. quasi-adj. Light, tossed hither and thither.
| 1660 R. Burney κέρδ. Δῶρον Ep. Ded. ii. 11 He [Cromwell] brought the Shuttlecock opprobrie upon the grave Counsell of the Land, and called them together only to kick them out. 1754 Stukeley Mem. (Surtees) III. 191 Now our shittlecock heads think of nothing but France. 1826 Miss Mitford Village II. 83 Or any other shuttlecock pate, giddy with happiness and vanity. 1903 J. C. Smith in R. Wallace: Life & Last Leaves 137 Shuttlecock retort was a familiar game with him. |
▪ II. ˈshuttlecock, v.
[f. shuttlecock n.]
1. trans. To throw, send backwards and forwards or to toss like a shuttlecock. Also fig.
| 1687 R. L'Estrange Brief Hist. Times i. 14 Transubstantiation, and Idolatry, the Bug-bear of the Times, has not been more Shittle-Cock'd, then this Argument. 1853 Tait's Mag. XX. 365 He is shuttle-cocked between London and Edinburgh. 1859 Thackeray Virgin. lxxvii, ‘Yes, if the phrase is to be shuttlecocked between us,’ I answered hotly. 1904 Blackw. Mag. Mar. 402 [Certain Companies] shuttlecocked their assets and liabilities from one to the other for balance-sheet purposes. 1955 Times 10 Aug. 5/2 What Rostand lightly shuttlecocks to and fro across this barrier M. Anouilh might nowadays have said more sadly. |
2. intr. To move or go backwards and forwards.
| 1790 H. Walpole Let. to Miss Berrys 8 Nov., A letter may have shuttle-cocked about. 1960 Times 23 Feb. 4/5 Miss Maxine Audley..played a part shuttle-cocking between lover, son, and husband. |