Forms: 4 choȝe, 4–5 chouȝhe, (s)chowhe, 4–7 choghe, 5 chowȝe, chowe, cowe, kowe, 5–6 choughe, 6 chowgh(e, (7 chugh, choff, chooffe, chaugh), 5– chough. [ME. choȝe, etc.; not found in OE., which had in same sense the forms cío, céo, ciae, chyae (? for cyhae). Cognate with MDu. cauwe, Du. kauw, app. from a WGer. type *kâwa, whence also ONF. cauwe, cave, OF. choë, choue, Walloon chauwe, chowe; also OHG. chåha, chå, MLG. kâ; and ON. *ká, *kǭ, whence Da. kaa, and north. ME. kaa, ka, mod.Sc. kae, occas. ME. co, coo, jackdaw. The relationship of the various types to each other is not clearly made out: Prof. Sievers suggests the existence of an OTeut. type with accent-mutation kǽ·hwâ- —kǽwâ·-. But whether the early OE. ciae in Erf. Gl., and chyae in Epinal, can be brought under these is doubted. The ME. variant cowe, beside chowe, strongly suggests for these forms adoption from OF.; but the choȝe, chowhe forms cannot be thus explained.]
1. A bird of the crow family; formerly applied somewhat widely to all the smaller chattering species, but especially to the common Jackdaw.
α. [c. 1000. Ælfric, Gram., IX. (Z.), 70. Haec cornix, þeos ceo. Ibid., Gloss., in Wr.-Wülcker, 132/4. Gracculus, vel monedula, ceo.]
c. 1305. E. E. P. (1862), 76. Blake monekes he seȝ As hit crowen & choȝen were.
c. 1381. Chaucer, Parl. Foules, 345. The thefe the Chowgh [v.r. crow(e, chough(e, choghe, chowhe, clough] and eke the iangling py.
1387. Trevisa, Higden (Rolls), IV. 307. Þe chouȝhe [monedula] answerde nouȝt.
1401. Pol. Poems (1859), II. 40. Chyteryng as chowȝes.
1481. Caxton, Myrr., II. xvi. 101. The chowe whan she fyndeth gold or syluer … hydeth and bereth it away.
1519. Horman, Vulg., 101. Chowghis and staris flee to gether in a flocke.
1530. Palsgr., Choughe a yong crowe, corneille.
1532–3. Act 24 Hen. VIII., x. Rookes, Crowes, and Choughs, doe yeerely deuoure and consume a wonderful and marueilous great quantity of corne and graine.
1581. J. Bell, Haddon’s Answ. Osor., 222 b. If the byrdes do pluck their own fethers againe, which they gave before to the chough?
1590. Shaks., Mids. N., III. ii. 21. Russed-pated choughes.
1620. J. Wilkinson, Treat. Coroners & Sherifes, 118. Crowes, Rookes, Choghes, Pyes, Jeyes, Ringdoves.
1623. Cockeram, A Chough or Iack daw.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, II. 248/1. The Jack Daw, or Daw … in some places is called a Caddesse, or Choff.
1857. Ruskin, Pol. Econ. Art, 122. The rain floods your warehouse,… the choughs build in it.
β. c. 1386. Chaucer, Wife’s Prol., 232. Shal bere hym on hond the Cow [v.r. cou, kow, kowe] is wood.
c. 1450. Gloss., in Wr.-Wülcker, 702/3. Hec monedula, a kowe.
1528. Roy, Rede me (Arb.), 80. They canne flatter and lye, Makynge beleve the cowe is wode.
1561. Awdelay, Frat. Vacab., 14. A pickthanke knaue, that would make his Maister beleue that the Cowe is woode.
b. fig. Chatterer, prater.
1610. Shaks., Temp., II. i. 266. Lords that can prate as amply … as this Gonzallo: I my selfe could make A chough of as deepe chat.
2. Now restricted to the Red-legged Crow (Fregillus Graculus), which frequents the sea-cliffs in many parts of Britain, being particularly abundant in Cornwall; whence distinguished as the Cornish Chough.
(This may have been Shakespeare’s ‘chough’ in Lear; the bird, now rare at Beachy Head, was abundant on all the Sussex cliffs a century ago, and may well have been common on the Kentish coast at an earlier date.)
a. 1566. Withals, Dict., 5. A cornishe chough, pyrrhocorax.
1602. Carew, Cornwall, 36 a. I meane not the common Daw, but one peculiar to Cornwall … termed a Cornish Chough, his bil is sharpe, long and red, his legs of the same colour.
1769. De Foe’s Tour Gt. Brit., I. 407. That famous King of Crows … known by the Name of the Cornish Chough.
1773. G. White, Selborne, xxxix. Cornish choughs abound, and breed on Beachy-head and on all the cliffs of the Sussex coast.
1875. F. Buckland, Note, in White’s Selborne, 425. Numbers of Cornish choughs are sent yearly from Plymouth to London…. The choughs are now very rare round Beachy Head.
b. [1605. Shaks., Lear, IV. vi. 13. The Crowes and Choughes, that wing the midway ayre.]
1611. Cotgr., Choguar, a Chough; or, Cornish Chough.
1646. Sir T. Browne, Pseud. Ep., VI. x. Some Chaughes came to have red legges and bils.
1841. Proc. Berw. Nat. Club, I. IX. 253. The red-legged chough (Fregilus graculus) … finds a congenial retreat.
1858. F. W. Robertson, Lect., 121. The flock of choughs, with their red beaks and legs.
3. Comb., as chough-daw (cf. CADAW), -fish.
1746. James, Health Improv. Interest, 40. The Swan, or Chough-Daw. It is of no great Importance which is here meant.
1601. Holland, Pliny, XXXII. xi. Dracunculus … like it is to the Chough-fish Gracculus.
Chough sb.2 obs. f. CHUFF, rustic.
