ˈparrot-coal Sc. and north. dial.
[Origin of parrot uncertain. (Quot. 1853 offers a fanciful guess.)]
The Scotch and northern name of cannel coal.
| a 1789 Black in Brand Hist. Newcastle (1789) II. 242 note, Parrot, or kennel coal. 1793 Statist. Acc. Scot., Fifesh. VIII. 451 There is, on the north parts of Torry, a fine parrot coal, in thickness 4 feet, which is very valuable. 1801 Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3) Suppl. II. 231/1 Cannel coal..is found in Lancashire, and in different parts of Scotland, where it is known by the name of parrot coal. 1853 Fleming in Pharmac. Jrnl. XIII. 124 ‘Parrot’..might be applied to them, from the fact that, when burning, they ‘chattered’ somewhat like a parrot. 1877 Le Conte Elem. Geol. v. (1879) 343 Cannel or parrot coal is a dense, dry, structureless, lustreless, highly-bituminous variety, which breaks with a conchoidal fracture. |