Forms: 1 cuopl, 5 kobil, cobyll, 5–6 cobill, 7–9 cobble, 4– coble. [ONorthumbrian cuopl appears to have no Teut. cognates; cf. Welsh ceubal, ceubol ferry-boat, skiff, lighter (prob.:—OWelsh *caupol), Bret. caubal, which Silvan Evans identifies with Lat. caupulus, -ilus, described by Isidore (Orig. XIX. i. 25) as ‘lembus, navicula brevis, quæ alia appellatione dicitur et cymba et caupolus (v.r. caupilus, -ulus).’ The word may be native in Celtic, and may contain the root ceu-, cau- hollow. The ONorth. form, if correct, is not the direct parent of the present.]
1. Sc. A short flat-bottomed rowing-boat used in salmon-fishing and for crossing rivers or lakes. [In south Scotl. often pronounced cowble (kōu·b’l).]
c. 950. Lindisf. Gosp., Matt. viii. 23. He astaʓ in lytlum scipe vel in cuople.
c. 1375. Sc. Leg. Saints, Ninian, 504. Ane olde coble þare he fand, Þat mony hoilis in it had.
c. 1425. Wyntoun, Cron., VIII. xxviii. 115. A lytil kobil thare thai mete And had thame oure, but langere lete.
1536. Bellenden, Cron. Scot. (1821), II. 146. Dongallus … come to the watter of Spey, and gat ane cobill to pas ouir the samin.
a. 1670. Spalding, Troub. Chas. I. (1829), 33. The salmon fishers rowed cobles with nets to catch it.
1875. Buckland, Log-Bk., 346. I went out in Mr. Miller’s Salmon Coble.
1884. Q. Victoria, More Leaves, 41. We took a short row on it [the lake] in a ‘coble’ rowed by the head keeper, Gregor M‘Gregor.
2. A sea fishing-boat with a flat bottom, square stern, and rudder extending 4 or 5 feet below the bottom, rowed with three pairs of oars, and furnished with a lug-sail; used chiefly on the N.E. coast of England.
1493. Newminster Cartul. (Surtees), 195. A cobyll wt ij oyres.
1527. Test. Ebor. (Surtees), V. 237. To the said Edmunde a coble called the Margarete.
1565. Wills & Inv. N. C. (1835), 246. I will that my wyffe shall haiue the best sea coble in hir custodye.
1667. Lond. Gaz., No. 194/4. This morning a Cobble, laden with Herrings … was unfortunately cast away.
1791–9. Statist. Acc., Haddingt., VII. 407 (Jam.). The fishers on this coast use two kinds of boats, the largest, called cobles, are different from the fishing-boats generally used, being remarkably flat in the bottom, and of a great length, measuring about 30 feet in keel.
1845. Proc. Berw. Nat. Club, II. 122. Embarking in a small coble, [they] were soon wafted across the tideway.
3. attrib. and Comb., as coble-boat, -man, -race.
1490. in Ld. Treas. Acc. Scotl., I. 133. To the cobill man of Cambuskynnell quhen the King past owre, vs.
1614. Markham, Way to Wealth, in Harl. Misc. (Malh.), III. 242. The fishermen, mackarel-catchers, nor the Cobblemen of the north-country.
1665. Lond. (Oxford) Gaz., No. 18/4. (Newcastle) Three Coble-boats fishing.
1863. Ridley’s Local Song-bk., 3. He rowed a coble race … doon at Blyth.
1866. Hon. Mrs. Norton, in Macm. Mag., XIII. 181/2. Gliding over its silver surface in the coble-boat, fishing for trout, and waking the echoes, as they rowed home.
