| 释义 |
▪ I. cosset, n.|ˈkɒsɪt|
Also 8 cossart.
[Not found before the 16th c.: derivation uncertain.
Prof. Skeat (Trans. Philol. Soc. 1889) has suggested that it is the same word as OE. cot-sǽta cot-sitter, dweller in a cot, cottar; cf. the Domesday forms, pl. coscez, cozets, cozez (z = ts). This is phonetically satisfactory, and the sense of ‘lamb dwelling in a cot’ or ‘kept by a cot-sǽta or cottar’ finds support in It. casiccio a tame lamb bred by hand, f. casa house; Ger. hauslamm house-lamb and ‘pet’, is analogous. Cf. also ‘Cotts, lambs brought up by hand, cades’, Marshall Rural Econ. E. Norfolk, 1787 (whence in Grose 1790). There is however a long gap between the coscez of Domesday and the cosset of 1579, during which no trace of the word in either sense has been found.]
1. A lamb (colt, etc.) brought up by hand; a pet-lamb, cade-lamb. Also attrib. as cosset lamb.
1579Spenser Sheph. Cal. Nov. 42, I shall thee give yond Cosset for thy payne. 1613W. Browne Sheph. Pipe Wks. 1772 III. 39 The best cosset in my fold. 1626Breton Fantastickes Apr. (D.), The cosset lamb is learned to butt. 1674Ray S. & E. C. Words 62 A Cosset lambe or colt, &c. i.e. a cade lamb, a lamb or colt brought up by the hand, Norf. Suff. 1749W. Ellis Sheph. Guide 77 A cossart-lamb in Hertfordshire is one left by its dam's dying by disease or hurt before it is capable of getting its own living; or is one that is taken from a ewe that brings two or three or four lambs at a yeaning, and is incapable of suckling and bringing them all up. 1883Sat. Rev. LVI. 109 The character of cosset lambs is notoriously bad; and..the pet horse is, as a rule, a somewhat uncertain animal in stable.
2. Applied to persons, etc.: A pet of any kind; a petted, spoilt child.
1596Nashe Saffron Walden 143 Who but an ingrain cosset would keepe such a courting of a Curtezan. 1614B. Jonson Barth. Fair i. i, I am for the cosset his charge. 1659Gauden Tears of Ch. 595 Some are such Cossets and Tantanies that they congratulate their Oppressors and flatter their Destroyers. a1700B. E. Dict. Cant. Crew, Cosset, a Fondling Child. a1825Forby Voc. E. Anglia, Cosset, a pet, something fondly caressed.
▪ II. cosset, v.|ˈkɒsɪt|
[f. prec. n. In literary use, chiefly of 19th c.]
trans. To treat as a cosset; to fondle, caress, pet, indulge, pamper.
1659Gauden Tears of Ch. 375 Episcopacy..was even pampered and cosetted by so excessive a favour. a1825Forby Voc. E. Anglia, Cosset, to fondle. 1857Sir F. Palgrave Norm. & Eng. II. 800 Henry, so cosseted during babyhood and boyhood by his grandmother. 1859H. Kingsley G. Hamlyn xxvi. (D.), I have been cosseting this little beast up. 1860Emerson Cond. Life i. (1861) 7 Nature is no sentimentalist—does not cosset or pamper us.
b. intr. or absol.
1871B. Taylor Faust (1875) II. iii. 201 Probe and dally, cosset featly, Test your wanton sport completely. 1889H. Weir Our Cats 11 Another [cat] would cosset up close to a sitting hen.
▪ III. cosset
variant of cossid. |