Ireland. Also 7 cochering. [f. COSHER v.1 + -ING1.]
† 1. Feasting. Obs. rare.
1577. Stanyhurst, Descr. Irel., in Holinshed, VI. 67. Their noble men, and noble mens tenants, now and then make a set feast, which they call coshering, wherto flocke all their reteiners, whom they name followers…. In their coshering they sit on straw, they are serued on straw.
2. The practice or custom, claimed as a right by Irish chiefs, of quartering themselves upon their dependants or tenants: see COSHERY 2.
1571. Campion, Hist. Irel., II. viii. (1633), 102. The Irish impositions of Coyne and Lyverie,… cosherings, bonnaght, and such like.
1605. T. Ryves, Vicar’s Plea (1620), 1. The lawes are executed in every place alike, cocherings are reduced to chiefe-rents.
1612. Davies, Why Ireland, etc. (1747), 169. Irish exactions;—namely cosherings; which were visitations and progresses made by the lord and his followers among his tenants; wherein he did eat them out of house and home.
1778. Phil. Surv. S. Irel., 44. A custom here called coshering, the source of the most grievous exactions.
1849. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., II. 130. Sometimes he contrived, in defiance of the law, to live by coshering, that is to say, by quartering himself on the old tenants of his family.
