Forms: 4–7 cote, coote, (5 cute, cuytt, 6–7 cout(e), 7– coot. [ME. cote, coote, corresp. to Du. koet (recorded c. 1600): a Low German word, the earlier history of which is unknown.
The long o of ME. cōte, evidenced also by the Du. form, which implies MDu. cōte, coete, makes impossible the conjecture that the word is connected with Welsh cwt short, which is on other grounds inadmissible. Prof. Newton thinks that there is a connection between coot and scoot or scout, another name of the guillemot, and allied sea-fowl; but the early history of the latter is obscure.]
1. A name originally given vaguely or generically to various swimming and diving birds. In many cases it seems to have been applied to the Guillemot (Uria troile), the Zee-koet or Sea-coot of the Dutch.
1382. Wyclif, Lev. xi. 16. An ostriche, and a nyȝt crowe, and a coote, and an hawke.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., XII. xxvi. (1495), 429. The Cote highte Mergulus and hath that name of ofte doppynge and plungynge. Ibid. It tokenyth moost certaynly full stronge tempeste in the see yf Cotes fle cryenge to the clyffes.
1773. Johnson, Journ. Scot., Slanes Castle. One of the birds that frequent this rock [Buchan Ness] has … its body not larger than a duck’s, and yet lays eggs as large as those of a goose. This bird is by the inhabitants named a Coot. That which is called Coot in England is here a Cooter. [This is some error: no such name is known.]
1885. Swainson, Prov. Names Birds, 218. Guillemot … Quet (Aberdeen). [Cf. Queit (Aberd.) = Coot in Jamieson.]
2. Afterwards restricted in literary use to the Bald Coot (Fulica atra, fam. Rallidæ), Meer-koet of the Dutch, a web-footed bird inhabiting the margins of lakes and still rivers, having the base of the bill extended so as to form a broad white plate on the forehead (whence the epithet bald); in U.S. applied to the allied F. Americana; and generically extended to all the species of Fulica.
[a. 1300. Gloss. W. de Bibbesw., in Wright, Voc., 165. Une blarye, a balled cote.]
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 95. Coote, byrde [MS. K, cote brydde], mergus, fullica.
1483. Cath. Angl., 87. A Cute [MS. A. Cuytt], fulica, mergus.
1486. Bk. St. Albans, F vj b. A Couert of cootis.
a. 1529. Skelton, P. Sparowe, 408. The doterell, that folyshe pek, And also the mad coote, With a balde face to toote.
1580. Hollyband, Treas. Fr. Tong, Foulque, a bird called a Coute.
1604. Drayton, Owle, 941. The Brain-bald Coot.
a. 1763. Shenstone, Odes (1765), 154. Where coots in rushy dingles hide.
1855. Tennyson, Brook, 23. I come from haunts of coot and hern.
1891. Boston (Mass.) Jrnl., 12 March, 4/1. Twelve redheads, one bald pate and a coot were secured during the day.
b. Proverbial phrases. As bald (bare, black) as a coot; as stupid as a coot (this and the epithet ‘mad coot’ may have originally applied to the Foolish Guillemot).
1430. Lydg., Chron. Troy, II. xv. And yet he was as balde as is a coote.
a. 1536. Tindale, Exp. 1 John Wks. (Parker Soc.), II. 224. The body … is made as bare as Job, and as bald as a coot.
1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., II. iii. I. ii. (1651), 599. I have an old grim sire to my husband, as bald as a cout.
1687. Hist. Sir J. Hawkwood, v. 9. They poled him as bare as a Coot, by shaving off his Hair.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, II. 272/1. The Proverb, as black as the Coot.
3. Locally applied (with distinctive additions) to the Water-rail and Water-hen or Gallinule.
1547. Salesbury, Welsh Dict., Mwyalch y dwr [lit. ‘ouzel of the water’: cf. ‘Brook ouzel’ = Water-rail (Swainson, 176)], A cote.
1847–78. Halliwell, Coot, the Water-hen.
1869. Lonsdale Gloss., Coot, the water-hen.
1885. Swainson, Provinc. Names Birds, 176. Water-rail … Skitty coot (Devon, Cornwall). Ibid., 178. Moor Hen … Cuddy. Moor coot. Kitty coot (Dorset).
4. fig. [Cf. 2 b.] A silly person, simpleton. (colloq., dial., and U.S.)
[1824. Hist. Gaming, 44. The poor plucked pigeon (now become a Bald Coot) lost his reason.]
1848–60. Bartlett, Dict. Amer., Coot … is often applied by us to a stupid person; as, ‘He is a poor coot.’
1845. S. Judd, Margaret, I. xv. 134. Little coot! Don’t you know the Bible is the best book in the world.
5. Comb., as † coot-foot, a name given by some to the Phalarope; coot-footed a., having feet like a coot’s; hence † Coot-footed Tringa, a name given by Edwards to the red or grey Phalarope Phalaropus fulicarius; coot-grebe, a name given by some to the Fin-foot or Sun-grebe Heliornis.
1757. Edwards, in Phil. Trans., L. 255. I chuse, by way of distinction, to name it the coot-footed tringa.
1768. Pennant, Zool. (1812), II. 126. Red Phalarope … This is the red coot footed tringa of Edwards.
