Obs. (exc. Hist.) Forms: 4 coge, kogge, 4–6 cogge, 4– cog. [ME. cogge, kogge (14th c.), corresponds in form and meaning alike to OF. cogue, (coge, koge, cogghe, guogue), also coque, a kind of ship, esp. ‘ship of war’ (Godefroy), and to MLG. kogge m. f., MDu. cogghe (Du. cogge, cog f.), MHG. kocke, 15th c. G. kock (OHG. coccho m.). With the latter cf. OSw. kogger m., Da. kogge, kog small vessel without a keel, Sw. dial. kåg, kåk small single-masted sail-boat (Rietz), ONorw. kuggr m. larger merchant-ship, esp. of the Hanse, Icel. kuggi small vessel.
Teutonic etymologists consider these words to be native, going back to OTeut. types *kuggon-, *kukkon-. The OF. forms on the other hand are usually taken as cognate with Pr. coca, coqua, Sp. coca, obs. It. cocca, ‘a kind of ship no longer in use, which had the prow and the poop much raised, with a single mast, and a square sail’ (Della Crusca), derived by Diez and others from a L. type *coccha, by-form of concha lit. ‘shell,’ also, in late or med.L., a species of boat or ship. The relations between the Teutonic and the Romanic, and esp. the OF., words are uncertain. The probability is that the ME. word was from French rather than LG.: like the Fr. it interchanged at an early date with cocke, COCK3, which afterwards was differentiated, and used only in sense of the Fr. dim. coquet cock-boat.]
1. A kind of ship of earlier times; broadly built, with roundish prow and stern. Supposed to have been primarily a ship of burden or transport, but also used as a ship of war. (App. not used after 15th c.: later mention only historical.)
c. 1325. Coer de L., 4784. Agaynes hem comen her naveye, Cogges & dromoundes, many galeye.
c. 1325. E. E. Allit. P., C. 152. [Of the ship of Tarshish containing Jonah] Þe sayl sweyed on þe see, þenne suppe bihoued Þe coge of þe colde water.
1352. Pol. Poems (1859), I. 72. The kogges of Ingland was broght out of bandes.
1470–85. Malory, Arthur, V. iii. A greete multitude of shyppes, galeyes, cogges and dromoundes, sayllynge on the see.
1480. Caxton, Chron. Eng., ccxxvi. 231. In the hauen of scluys many shippes and cogges were taken.
[1700. Tyrrell, Hist. Eng., II. 795. Fourscore Cogs, a sort of small Transport-Vessels.
1851. Turner, Dom. Archit., II. iii. 115. Their cogs and barques lying at the wharves of Thames Street.]
† b. A kind of craft formerly used on the Humber and Ouse between Hull and York. Obs.
1531–2. Stat. 23 Hen. VIII., c. 18. Many shyppes, keyles, cogges, and botes … haue heretofore had theyr franke passagis … vpon the saide riuer.
1536. in F. Drake, Eboracum, I. vii. (1736), 230. That several persons inhabiting on the banks of the river, had presumed … to place … fishgarths, [etc.] … to the great damage and hindrance of the free passage … of many ships, keyles, coggs, and boats.
1708–15. Kersey, Cogs, a kind of Boats us’d on the Rivers Ouse and Humber.
c. 1385. Chaucer, L. G. W., 1477, Hipsiphile & Medea. Jason & Ercules also That in a cog [v.r. cogge] to londe were I-go Hem to refresche.
c. 1470. Harding, Chron., ccvii. iii. [He] … brought his fiers brennyng vpon the sea In botes and cogges [v.r. cockes].
1513. Douglas, Æneis, X. vi. 7. And sum with airis into coggis small Etlyt to land.
1600. Fairfax, Tasso, XIV. lviii. And for the cogge was narrow, small and strait, Alone he row’d.
3. Comb. cog-boat = COCK-BOAT.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 86. Cogboote [Pynson cokbote], scafa.
1610. Holland, Camden’s Brit., II. 206. No man who built ship or cog boat durst drive into it above three nailes. Ibid., 210. Olaue fled in a little Cog-boat unto his father in law.
1890. A correspondent says ‘Cog-boat is a term well known on the Humber as applied to a small boat belonging to a sailing vessel of any sort.’
