sb. A conventional representation of the crow of the cock; a name for this, and hence, a nursery or humorous name for the cock (also cock-a-doodle).

1

1573.  G. Harvey, Letter-bk. (1884), 31. The yung cockerels … followid after with a cockaloodletoo as wel as ther strenhth wuld suffer them.

2

1610.  Shaks., Temp., I. ii. 386. Hark, hark, I heare, the straine of strutting Chanticlere cry cockadidle-dowe.

3

1674.  Flatman, Belly God, 24, in Poems & Songs, 120.

        ’Ere since the brooding Rump they’re addle too,
In the long Egg lyes Cock-a-doodle-doo.

4

1719.  D’Urfey, Pills, I. 308. My dear Cock a doodle, My Jewel, my Joy.

5

1798.  Southey, Ballads, Surgeon’s Warning. The Cock he crew cock-a-doodle-do, Past five! the watchman said.

6

1841.  Lever, C. O’Malley, II. lxxxiv. 85. His voice was lost in a loud cock-a-doo-do-doo, that some bold chanticleer set up at the moment.

7

1852.  Reade, Peg Woff., 25. It [whistling] seemed not unlike a small cock-a-doodle-doo of general defiance.

8

  attrib.  1856.  Reade, Never too Late, III. xxxiii. 322 (D.). Living almost entirely upon cock-a-doodle broth—eggs beat up in brandy and a little water.

9

  Hence Cock-a-doodle v., to crow.

10

1599.  Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (1871), 77. The cockadoodling cocks.

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