COXCOMB • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Coxcomb

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

Listen

noun

Coxcomb n.

(a)

A strip of red cloth notched like the comb of a cock, which licensed jesters formerly wore in their caps.

(b)

The cap itself.

The top of the head, or the head itself. "We will belabor you a little better, And beat a little more care into your coxcombs."

A vain, showy fellow; a conceited, silly man, fond of display; a superficial pretender to knowledge or accomplishments; a fop. "Fond to be seen, she kept a bevy Of powdered coxcombs at her levee." "Some are bewildered in the maze of schools, And some made coxcombs, nature meant but fools."

(Bot.) A name given to several plants of different genera, but particularly to Celosia cristata, or garden cockscomb. Same as Cockscomb.

See images of 'Coxcomb'

Etymology of 'Coxcomb'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar

"Coxcomb" Quotes from Famous Books

... unaware of the probable Consequence; where there was a Puppy, of Quality, in the Case, who had, even without Provocation, drawn his Sword on the poor passive PAMELA. Far from bearing a Thought of exciting an abler Resentment, to the Danger of a Quarrel with so worthless a Coxcomb, how charmingly natural, apprehensive, and generous, is her Silence (during the Recital she makes of her Sufferings) with regard to this masculine Part of the Insult! as also her Prevention of Mrs. Jewkes's less delicate Bluntness, when she was beginning ...

— Samuel Richardson's Introduction to Pamela • Samuel Richardson

... bell, bonny bell, ring for the wedding! First the three ushers on grasshoppers ride; Coxcomb, Larkspur, and gallant Sweet William, Handsome young dandies ...

— Five Mice in a Mouse-trap - by the Man in the Moon. • Laura E. Richards

... frisky little pet for him to fondle and feed. How he could grieve for her is more than I could understand. I didn't miss her,—I was glad she was gone. Every day Phil put fresh flowers on her grave. Sometimes it was only a stiff red coxcomb or a little stemless geranium that had escaped the early frost. Sometimes it was only a handful of bright grasses gone to seed. The doctor's neglected garden flaunted few blooms this autumn, but the little fellow, grieving long and sorely, ...

— The Story of Dago • Annie Fellows-Johnston

... himself, by black Ralph Leslie—the devil take the rapier that ran not through from side to side! Ralph has a bloody coxcomb, by a blow from a messan-page whom nobody knew—Dick Seyton of Windygowl is run through the arm, and two gallants of the Leslies have suffered phlebotomy. This is all the gentle blood which has been spilled in the revel; but a yeoman or two on both sides have had bones broken and ears chopped. ...

— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott

... would marry some day, and what then? He looked the inevitable in the face; but as he looked, that face grew an ugly one. He broke into a laugh: his soul had settled like a brooding cloud over the gulf that lay between a fisher lad and the daughter of a peer! But although he was no coxcomb, neither had fed himself on romances, as Lady Florimel had been doing of late, and although the laugh was quite honestly laughed at himself, it was nevertheless a bitter one. For again came the question: Why should an absurdity be a possibility? It was absurd, ...

— Malcolm • George MacDonald

More quotes...