Carp. [A technical word of most uncertain form, occurring also as cauk, caulk, calk, and recently cog, and prob. the same as COAK. If the historical form is (as in quot. 1663) cock, *cok, it may represent a North Fr. *cok-er, *coqu-er = F. cocher to notch, fit with a notch or notches, f. coche, Pr. coca, It. cocca notch, ‘a dent cut in any thing.’ Of this, coak, cauk might be phonetic variants, spelt caulk, calk, by association with better-known words. See also COG sb.3]
1. trans. To let the end of (a beam) into a wall-plate, or other supporting timber, by cutting the bearing end into steppings or a dove-tail, to fit into corresponding notches cut in the plate or supporting timber. Hence Cocking vbl. sb.
1663. Gerbier, Counsel, 43. To see the Carpenters cock the main Beams into the Lentals, to hold the wall the better.
1703. T. N., City & C. Purchaser, 30. The Beam is cauked down [which is the same as Dove-tailing a Cross].
1819. Nicholson, Arch. Dict., I. 262. Cocking … securing beams to wall-plates by notching each beam … on the under edge … and cutting reverse notches out of the top of the wall-plate. Ibid. (1823), Pract. Builder, 129. Cocking or Cogging.
1876. Gwilt, Encycl. Archit., Gloss., Caulking or Cocking, the mode of fixing the tie-beams of a roof or the binding joists of a floor down to the wall-plates.
2. To secure a piece of timber having a projecting tenon across another having a corresponding notch or mortice; to secure crossing beams by any device of the nature or effect of mortice and tenon.
1854. in Arch. Soc. Dict., Caulking, Calking, Cocking, Cogging, or Corking.
1874. Knight, Dict. Mech., Cocking … Mortising.
3. See COAK v.
