▪ I. coot, n.1
(kuːt)
Forms: 4–7 cote, coote, (5 cute, cuytt, 6–7 cout(e), 7– coot.
[ME. cote, coote, corresp. to Du. koet (recorded c 1600); a Low German word, the earlier history of which is unknown.
The long o of ME. cōte, evidenced also by the Du. form, which implies MDu. *cōte, coete, makes impossible the conjecture that the word is connected with Welsh cwt short, which is on other grounds inadmissible. Prof. Newton thinks that there is a connexion between coot and scoot or scout, another name of the guillemot, and allied sea-fowl; but the early history of the latter is obscure.]
1. A name originally given vaguely or generically to various swimming and diving birds. In many cases it seems to have been applied to the Guillemot (Uria troile), the Zee-koet or Sea-coot of the Dutch.
| 1382 Wyclif Lev. xi. 16 An ostriche, and a nyȝt crowe, and a coote, and an hawke. 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xii. xxvi. (1495) 429 The Cote highte Mergulus and hath that name of ofte doppynge and plungynge. Ibid., It tokenyth moost certaynly full stronge tempeste in the see yf Cotes fle cryenge to the clyffes. 1773 Johnson Journ. Scot., Slanes Castle, One of the birds that frequent this rock [Buchan Ness] has..its body not larger than a duck's, and yet lays eggs as large as those of a goose. This bird is by the inhabitants named a Coot. That which is called Coot in England is here a Cooter. [This is some error: no such name is known.] 1885 Swainson Prov. Names Birds 218 Guillemot..Quet (Aberdeen). [Cf. Queit (Aberd.) = Coot in Jamieson.] |
2. a. Afterwards restricted in literary use to the Bald Coot (Fulica atra, family Rallidæ), Meer-koet of the Dutch, a web-footed bird inhabiting the margins of lakes and still rivers, having the base of the bill extended so as to form a broad white plate on the forehead (whence the epithet bald); in U.S. applied to the allied F. Americana; and generically extended to all the species of Fulica.
| [a 1300 Gloss. W. de Biblesw. in Wright Voc. 165 Une blarye, a balled cote.] c 1440 Promp. Parv. 95 Coote, byrde [MS. K, cote brydde], mergus, fullica. 1483 Cath. Angl. 87 A Cute [MS. A, Cuytt], fulica, mergus. 1486 Bk. St. Albans F vj b, A Couert of cootis. a 1529 Skelton P. Sparowe 408 The doterell, that folyshe pek, And also the mad coote, With a balde face to toote. 1580 Hollyband Treas. Fr. Tong, Foulque, a bird called a Coute. 1604 Drayton Owle 941 The Brain-bald Coot. 1709 J. Lawson Voy. Carolina 149 Black Flusterers... Some call these the great bald Coot. a 1763 Shenstone Odes (1765) 154 Where coots in rushy dingles hide. 1789 Morse Amer. Geogr. 59 Upwards of one hundred and thirty American birds have been enumerated..[including] the bald coot. 1855 Tennyson Brook 23, I come from haunts of coot and hern. 1891 Boston (Mass.) Jrnl. 12 Mar. 4/1 Twelve redheads, one bald pate and a coot were secured during the day. 1898 Morris Austral Eng. 16/1 Bald-Coot, a bird-name, Porphyrio melanotus, Temm.; Blue, P. bellus, Gould. 1928 D. Cottrell Singing Gold i. ii. 16, I might see..a red-legged blue baldcoot, glittering like metal. |
b. Proverbial phrases. as bald (bare, black) as a coot; as stupid as a coot (this and the epithet ‘mad coot’ may have originally applied to the Foolish Guillemot).
| 1430 Lydg. Chron. Troy. ii. xv, And yet he was as balde as is a coote. a 1536 Tindale Exp. 1 John Wks. (Parker Soc.) II. 224 The body..is made as bare as Job, and as bald as a coot. 1621 Burton Anat. Mel. iii. iii. i. ii. (1651) 599 I have an old grim sire to my husband, as bald as a cout. 1687 Hist. Sir J. Hawkwood v. 9 They poled him as bare as a Coot, by shaving off his Hair. 1688 R. Holme Armoury ii. 272/1 The Proverb, as black as the Coot. |
3. Locally applied (with distinctive additions) to the Water-rail and Water-hen or Gallinule.
| 1547 Salesbury Welsh Dict., Mwyalch y dwr [lit. ‘ouzel of the water’: cf. ‘Brook ouzel’ = Water-rail (Swainson, 176)], A cote. 1847–78 Halliwell, Coot, the Water-hen. 1869 Lonsdale Gloss., Coot, the water-hen. 1885 Swainson Provinc. Names Birds 176 Water-rail..Skitty coot (Devon, Cornwall). Ibid. 178 Moor Hen..Cuddy. Moor coot. Kitty coot (Dorset). |
4. fig. [Cf. 2 b.] A silly person, simpleton. (colloq., dial., and U.S.)
| 1766 Sewel & Buys Compl. Dict., Eng. & Dutch 138/2 A very coot, (or fool). 1794 Gazette of U.S. (Philad.) 17 Jan. (Th.), But Satan was not such a coot To sell Judea for a goat. [1824 Hist. Gaming 44 The poor plucked pigeon (now become a Bald Coot) lost his reason.] 1848–60 Bartlett Dict. Amer., Coot..is often applied by us to a stupid person; as, ‘He is a poor coot’. a 1852 F. M. Whitcher Widow Bedott P. (1883) ix. 33 He's an amazin' ignorant old coot. a 1860 Margaret 134 (Bartlett) Little coot! don't you know the Bible is the best book in the world? 1929 W. Smyth Girl from Mason Creek i. 17 You're a clumsy coot. 1963 Daily Mail 26 Aug. 4/2 Masters call boys ‘coots’ and boys call each other ‘nits’. |
5. Comb., as † coot-foot, a name given by some to the Phalarope; coot-footed a., having feet like a coot's; hence † coot-footed tringa, a name given by Edwards to the red or grey Phalarope Phalaropus fulicarius; coot-grebe, a name given by some to the Fin-foot or Sun-grebe Heliornis.
| 1757 Edwards in Phil. Trans. L. 255, I chuse, by way of distinction, to name it the coot-footed tringa. 1768 Pennant Zool. (1812) II. 126 Red Phalarope..This is the red coot footed tringa of Edwards. |
▪ II. coot, n.2 Sc.
Also cuit, cute (k{obar}t).
[A com. Low German word, found in Sc. since c 1500: cf. MDu. cōte, cöte, Flem. keute, Du. koot fem., knuckle-bone; East Fris. kote, kôt ankle-joint, ankle; OFris. kâte joint, knuckle; MLG. kote, LG. kote, köte, also in mod.G. in sense ‘pastern-joint, fetlock’: see Grimm.]
1. The ankle-joint.
| 1508 Dunbar in Flyting 232 Ffor rerd of the, and rattling of thy butis..Sum claschis the, sum cloddis the on the cutis. 1681 S. Colvil Whigs Supplic. (1751) 17 Some had hoggars, some straw boots, Some uncover'd legs and coots. a 1810 Tannahill Poems (1846) 81 Whyles o'er the coots in holes he plumped. 1818 Blackw. Mag. III. 531 With feet, with cuits, unshod—but clean. |
2. The fetlock of a horse.
| 1681 S. Colvil Whigs Supplic. (1751) 81 Rub my horse-belly and his coots, And when I get them, dight my boots. |
3. A thing of small value; a trifle.
Perhaps, orig. a knuckle-bone used by children in playing, as in MDu. cote ‘osselet du bout des piedz de bestes, de quoy jouent les enfants, astragalus, talus’ (Plantijn): see also Grimm, Köte 3.
| 1550 Lyndesay Sqr. Meldrum 294 Your crakkis I count thame not ane cute. a 1605 Montgomerie Sonn. xlvi. (1886), I count ȝour cunning is not worth a cute. ― Misc. Poems xlvi, I count not of my lyf a cute. 1631 A. Craig Pilgr. & Hermite 9, I care not a cuit for her sake to bee slayne. |
4. Comb., as coot-bone, ankle-bone, knuckle-bone, esp. as used to play with.
| 1648–60 Hexham Dutch Dict., Pickelen, to Play at Coot-bone as boyes doe. |
▪ III. coot, v.1 ? Obs.
intr. Of tortoises: To copulate. Hence ˈcooting vbl. n.
| 1667 H. Stubbe in Phil. Trans. II. 500 The Tortoises..coot for fourteen daies together. 1699 W. Dampier Voy. II. Index s.v. Turtle, When they Coot or Couple. 1750 G. Hughes Barbadoes 309 In cooting-time. |
▪ IV. coot, v.2 local.
(kuːt)
[Deriv. obscure: some associate it with cote in dove-cote, bell-cote.]
To slope back the upper part of the gable of a house, the end of a hay-rick, etc., so as to form a ‘pavilion’ or ‘tabernacle’ roof. Hence ˈcooted, ppl. a., ˈcooting, vbl. n.
| 1813 Davis Agric. Wilts 258–268 (in Archæol. Rev. Mch. 1888) Hay-ricks are..sometimes oblong with cooted ends, not gable ends. 1892 Correspt. at Mere, Wilts. A rick or cottage has its ends ‘cooted’ or ‘cooted in’, when instead of being carried up perpendicularly to the ridge, they are so carried up only to the same height as the side-walls, and then sloped back. Sometimes the ends are carried perpendicularly to a greater height than the sides, and then sloped back: this is called half-cooting... Gable-end ricks are rarely seen here, the general practice being to coot them in. |
▪ V. coot(e
obs. f. coat, cot.