Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Cockney |
CockneyAdjective1. Characteristic of Cockneys or their dialect; "Cockney vowels". 2. Relating to or resembling a cockney; "Cockney street urchins". Noun1. A native of the east end of London. 2. The nonstandard dialect of natives of the east end of London. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "Cockney" was first used: 1600. (references) |
Etymology: Cockney \Cock"ney\ (k[o^]k"n[y^]), noun; plural Cockneys(-n[i^]z). [Old English cocknay, cokenay, a spoiled child, effeminate person, an egg; probably orig. a cock's egg, a small imperfect egg; Old English cok cock + nay, neye, for ey egg (compare to Newt), Anglo-Saxon [ae]g. See 1st Cock, Egg. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Literature | Cockney One born within sound of Bow-bells, London; one possessing London peculiarities of speech, etc.; one wholly ignorant of country sports, country life, farm animals, plants, and so on. Camden says the Thames was once called "the Cockney." The word has been spelt Cockeney, Cockaneys, Cocknell, etc. "Cocknell" would be a little cock. "Puer in deliciis matris nutritus, " Anglice, a kokenay, a pampered child. "Niais" means a nestling, as faucon niais, and if this is the last syllable of "Cockney," it confirms the idea that the word means an enfant gâté. Wedgwood suggests cocker (to fondle), and says a cockerney or cockney is one pampered by city indulgence, in contradistinction to rustics hardened by outdoor work. (Dutch, kokkeler, to pamper; French, coqueliner, to dangle.) Chambers in his Journal derives the word from a French poem of the thirteenth century, called The Land of Cocagne, where the houses were made of barley-sugar and cakes, the streets paved with pastry, and the shops supplied goods without requiring money in payment. The French, at a very early period, called the English cocagne men, i.e. bons vivants (beef and pudding men). "Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the cels, when she put them into the paste alive."- Shakespeare: Lear, ii. 4. The king of cockneys. A master of the revels chosen by students of Lincoln's Inn on Childermas Day (Dec. 28th). Source: Brewer's Dictionary. |
Slang in 1811 | COCKNEY: A nick name given to the citizens of London, or persons born within the sound of Bow bell, derived from the following story: A citizen of London, being in the country, and hearing a horse neigh, exclaimed, Lord! how that horse laughs! A by-stande. Source: 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
The term was in use in this sense as early as 1600, when Samuel Rowlands in his satire The Letting of Humours Blood in the Head-Vaine, referred to 'a Bow-bell Cockney'. John Minsheu (or Minshew) was the first lexicographer to define the word in this sense, in his Ductor in Linguas (1617). However, the etymologies he gave (from 'cock' and 'neigh', or from Latin incoctus, raw) were just guesses, and the OED later authoritatively explained the term as originating from cock and egg, meaning first a misshapen egg (1362), then a person ignorant of country ways (1521), then the senses mentioned above.
The church of St Mary-le-Bow was destroyed in the Great Fire of London and rebuilt by Christopher Wren. After the bells were destroyed again in 1941 in the Blitz of World War II, and before the bells were replaced in 1961, there was a period when no 'true' Cockneys could be born.
Cockney speakers have a distinctive accent and dialect, and frequently use Cockney rhyming slang.
See also:
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Cockney."
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Commonalty | Commoner, one of the people, democrat, plebeian, republican, proletary, proletaire, roturier, Mr. Snooks, bourgeois, epicier, Philistine, grisette, demimonde. |
Barbarous, barbarian, barbaric, barbaresque;barbarous, barbarian, barbaric, barbaresque; cockney, born within sound of Bow bells. | |
Inhabitant | Noun: inhabitant; resident, residentiary; dweller, indweller; addressee; occupier, occupant; householder, lodger, inmate, tenant, incumbent, sojourner, locum tenens, commorant; settler, squatter, backwoodsman, colonist; islander; denizen, citizen; burgher, oppidan, cit, townsman, burgess; villager; cottager, cottier, cotter; compatriot; backsettler, boarder; hotel keeper, innkeeper; habitant; paying guest; planter. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Cockney |
| English words defined with "Cockney": Bowbell ♦ Cockneyfy, Cockneyism, Cockneys, Cokenay. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "Cockney": Badaud, Branghtons ♦ Castle of Bungay. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "Cockney": Cokenay. (references) |
| Non-English Usage: "Cockney" is also a word in the following languages with English translations in parentheses. German (cockney), Italian (cockney), Romanian (cockney), Spanish (cockney), Swedish (cockney). |
Ploughboy and the Cockney, The (performing artist: Steeleye Span - Prior/Hart)
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.
| "Cockney" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 71.81% of the time. "Cockney" is used about 149 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 71.81% | 107 | 31,463 |
| Noun (proper) | 26.85% | 40 | 54,274 |
| Adjective (general or positive) | 1.34% | 2 | 245,945 |
| Total | 100.00% | 149 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
| Hypenated Usage | |
Ending with "Cockney": fellow-cockney, French-cockney, mock-cockney, Non-cockney. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day | Expression | Frequency per Day |
cockney and rhyming and slang | 54 | cockney rhyming | 4 |
cockney | 48 | cockney rhyme | 4 |
cockney reject | 41 | cockney translator | 4 |
cockney slang | 28 | cockney english slang | 3 |
cockney rebel | 12 | cockney cockney english slang | 3 |
cockney english | 10 | cockney dialect | 3 |
cockney dictionary | 8 | cockney english london | 3 |
accent cockney | 7 | cockney east end english | 3 |
cockney lyrics reject | 7 | cockney language | 2 |
harley steve cockney rebel | 7 | cockney rhyme slang | 2 |
cockney dictionary rhyming slang | 4 | cockney dictionary slang | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Language | Translations for "Cockney"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | kokni, karakteristik për kokni. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | характерен за лондончанина, характерен за лондон, кокни, лондонско наречие. (various references) | |
Czech | londýòan (londoner), koknejský, koknej. (various references) | |
German | Londoner (cockneys, London, londoner). (various references) | |
Hungarian | városlakó (citizen, townsman, towny, urbanite), városi ember (citizen), londoni szültetésû, londoni születésû ember, londoni születésű ember, londoni születésű, kényes ember, finnyás ember. (various references) | |
Italian | cockney. (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | コスト効率 (bowling in a bowling alley that is lit up like a disco with lots of flashing lights, cockatrice, Cocker spaniel, cockpit, cockroach, cook, coq d'or, cosmetic, cosmetic lens, cosmetics, cosmetology, cosmic, cosmology, cosmonaut, cosmopolis, cosmopolitan, cosmopolitanism, cosmos, cost effectiveness, costume play, cottage, cotton, cox, faucet, glass, Kodak, rough play, spigot, tap). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | コックニー . (various references) | |
Manx | Lunnish, Lunninagh (Londoner). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | ockneycay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | londrino (londoner), dialeto londrino. (various references) | |
Romanian | cockney, londonez (londoner), dialect londonez. (various references) | |
Russian | свойственный кокни, горожанин (burgher, citizen, oppidan, townee, townsman, townsmen, townspeople). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | prost londonac, kokni narečje, kokni. (various references) | |
Spanish | cockney, londinense de la clase popular, de cockney. (various references) | |
Swedish | cockney-, cockney. (various references) | |
Turkish | londra'nın doğusundan, doğu londra'lı, doğu londra şivesi. (various references) | |
Ukrainian | характерний для кокні, кокні. (various references) | |
Vietnamese | có đặc tính người ở khu đông Luân-đôn. (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Old English | 450-1100 | cocena. (various references) |
| Middle English | 1100-1500 | cokenei. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "Cockney": cockneyfied, cockneyfies, cockneyfy, cockneyfying, cockneyish, cockneyism, cockneyisms, cockneys. (additional references) | |
| |
"Cockney" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: cccdna, Ccny, cocken-ey, cockkey, cockley, cockne, Cockpen, cocksey, cocne, cocny, cokne, cokny, cuccini, mockney, Rockne. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "Cockney" (pronounced kÄ"knē) |
| 3 | -k n ē | acne, Hackney. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "c-c-e-k-n-o-y" | |
-2 letters: cocky, coney, conky. | |
-3 letters: coke, cone, conk, cony, keno, neck, nock, once, yock, yoke. | |
-4 letters: con, coy, eon, ken, key, oke, one, yen, yok, yon. | |
-5 letters: en, ne, no, oe, on, oy, ye, yo. | |
| Words containing the letters "c-c-e-k-n-o-y" | |
+1 letter: cockneys. | |
+2 letters: cockneyfy. | |
+3 letters: cockneyish, cockneyism. | |
+4 letters: cockneyfied, cockneyfies, cockneyisms, cytokinetic. | |
+5 letters: bodychecking, cockeyedness, cockneyfying. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Crosswords 3. Usage Frequency 4. Expressions | 5. Expressions: Internet 6. Translations: Modern 7. Translations: Ancient 8. Derivations | 9. Rhymes 10. Anagrams 11. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
