bald-coot
Also (metri gratiâ) baldicoot.
Popular name for the Coot (Fulica atra), from its pure white wide frontal plate, destitute of feathers. Used fig. and contemptuously as = bald-head. Cf. coot n.1 2.
| a 1300 W. de Biblesworth in Wright Voc. 165 Une blarye (glossed) a balled cote. 1616 Beaum. & Fl. Knt. Malta i. i, Unfledge them of their..perriwigs, And they appear like bald-cootes, in the nest. 1802 in G. Montagu Ornith. Dict. 1823 Byron Juan xiv. lxxxiii, The bald-coot bully, Alexander. 1848 Kingsley Saint's Trag. iii. iv. 176 Your princesses, that..demean themselves to hob and nob with these black baldicoots [i.e. monks with shaven crowns]! |