Forms: 5–6 coronette, 5–8 -ett, (7 coronate), 6– coronet. [a. OF. coronete, -ette, later couronnette, dim. of corone, couronne CROWN: see -ET. Also reduced to CRONET, and refashioned as CROWNET, q.v.]
1. A small or inferior crown; spec. a crown denoting a dignity inferior to that of the sovereign, worn by the nobility, and varying in form according to rank.
1494. Fabyan, Chron., VII. 603. .iii. ladyes rychely clad in golde and sylke, with coronettes vpon theyr heddes.
1547. Boorde, Introd. Knowl., 185. The Duke weryth a coronet ouer a cap of sylke.
1601. Shaks., Jul. C., I. ii. 239. I sawe Marke Antony offer him a Crowne, yet ’twas not a Crowne neyther, ’twas one of these Coronets. Ibid. (1613), Hen. VIII., IV. i. 54. 1 All the rest are Countesses. 2 Their Coronets say so.
1828. Scott, F. M. Perth, x. ‘By my coronet—by my knightly faith, it is true!’ said the Earl.
1833. Tennyson, Lady Clara V. de V., vii. Kind hearts are more than coronets.
1876. World, V. 3. He has no children to whom he might bequeath the well-earned coronet.
fig. 1813. Shelley, Q. Mab, 99. The fair star That gems the glittering coronet of morn.
b. A figure of a coronet (in Heraldry, etc.).
1678. Butler, Hud., III. ii. 872. Ladies … With coronets at their foot men’s breeches.
1749. Fielding, Tom Jones, XVII. iv. Are there no charms in the thoughts of having a coronet on your coach?
1864. Boutell, Heraldry Hist. & Pop., xvii. 265. It … became a usage in the fifteenth century to have the Crest rise from out of a Coronet.
2. A fillet or wreath of beautiful workmanship or precious materials, worn as an ornament round the temples; esp. in modern costume, a decorative part of a woman’s head-dress, consisting of a plate or band of metal, or the like, encircling the front of the head.
1599. Microcynicon (Fairholt), But oh her silver framed Coronet With lowe downe dangling spangles all beset.
1601. Dent, Pathw. Heaven (1831), 38. Wearing of perriwigs, and other hair coronets and top-gallants.
1687. Lond. Gaz., No. 2230/4. A pair of Flanders lac’d Ruffles and Coronet.
1725. De Foe, Voy. round World (1840), 132. He made a nice garland, or rather a coronet, of sundry strings of beads.
1822. S. Rogers, Italy, Ginevra. And on her brow, fairer than alabaster, A coronet of pearls.
1836. W. Irving, Astoria, II. 49. They wear gay coronets of plumes, particularly those of the swan.
b. A chaplet or garland of flowers for the head.
1590. Shaks., Mids. N., IV. i. 57. She his hairy temples then had rounded, With coronet of fresh and fragrant flowers.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 546. That varietie of floures which she gathered and couched together … in her Coronets.
1774. J. Bryant, Mythol., II. 400. We find it [the Nymphæa] … used for a kind of coronet upon figures of Orus.
1825. J. Neal, Bro. Jonathan, III. 335. Thy coronet of rich flowers.
3. = CORONA 7 b; formerly, also, a whorl of small flowers as in Labiates; a flowering head of an umbelliferous or composite plant (cf. CORONA 7 c).
1555. Fardle Facions, I. iii. 37. The coronettes of their Pasnepes and Garden Thistles … [are said] to be twelue Cubites compasse.
1657. W. Coles, Adam in Eden, ccx. 330. Feild Calamint, with whorled Coronets.
1845. Lindley, Sch. Bot., i. (1858), 15. Sometimes there is within, or upon, the corolla, a cup, as in the Daffodil, or a ring of scales, as in the Passion-flower; this is the Coronet.
† 4. Arch. The capital of a column. Obs.
1555. Fardle Facions, II. xii. 301. Pilers … upon whose coronettes or heades the … rofe of the Churche maye reste.
5. Farriery. The lowest part of the pastern of a horse, immediately above the coffin; also the bone of this part, the CORONARY bone.
1686. A. Snape, Anat. Horse, V. xii. 223. Rasing the Hoof from the Coronet or top of it to the very bottom … untill … the Bloud come.
1792. Osbaldiston, Brit. Sportsman, 122/2. The coronet of a horse’s foot, is that part on the very top of it where the hair grows.
1833. Sir C. Bell, Hand (ed. 3), 94. In the horse’s leg the five bones … of the second phalanx [are consolidated] into the lesser pastern or coronet.
6. = CORONAL sb. 3. (See also CRONET.)
1731. In Bailey, vol. II.
7. Short for Coronet moth: see 8.
8. attrib. and Comb. Coronet moth, a collector’s name of Acronycta Ligustri.
1778. Miss Burney, Evelina, liii. I perceived among the carriages … a coronet-coach.
1819. G. Samouelle, Entomol. Compend., 250. Noc[tua] Ligustri (coronet [moth]).
1829. Southey, Sir T. More, II. 161. Old family-trees, especially of the coronet-bearing kind.
1869. E. Newman, Brit. Moths, No. 432. The Coronet.
