a. and sb. Also 8 Sc. colsie, 8–9 cosie, cozie. [Orig. Sc. (and perh. north. Eng.): derivation unknown.
Guesses are that it is connected with COSH, or with Gaelic còsagach ‘full of holes or crevices; sheltered, snug, warm,’ f. còsag little hole, crevice, dim. of còs hollow, hole. But neither of these seems tenable, the phonetic form and the sense both presenting difficulties. App. the primary sense was of personal condition, not of places or circumstances.]
A. adj. 1. Of persons: Comfortable from being warm and sheltered; snug.
1709. W. Guthrie, Serm., 24 (Jam.). When Israel was colsie at hame.
1728. Ramsay, Last Sp. Miser, vi. To keep you cosie in a hoord.
1744. Mrs. Delany, Life & Corr. (1861), II. 311. Where I hope you’ll be cosy and free from bustle and fatigue.
1837. Dickens, Pickw., xxx. After Mr. Bob Sawyer had informed him that he meant to be very cosey.
1865. Englishman’s Mag., Jan., 7. He lay warm and cozy.
2. Of a place: a. Sheltered and thus warm; this passes into the sense of b. Sheltering, keeping warm, in which one is warm and comfortable. Often both notions are involved.
1785. Burns, To J. Smith, xviii. Then cannie, in some cozie place, They close the day.
1796. Macneill, Will & Jean, I. xxii. Firs the high craigs cleading, Raised a’ round a cosey screen.
1806. Miss Wordsworth, Address to Child. Here’s a cozie warm house for Edward and me.
1857. Kingsley, Two Y. Ago, II. 219. Frank leaned back in a cosey arm-chair.
1884. Q. Victoria, More Leaves, 105. The rooms so cozy and nice.
B. sb. † 1. (See quot.) Obs.
[1856. Engineer, I. 117/1 (title), Patent Cosy Express. Mr. H. R. Abraham’s Patent Cosy Carriage.]
1858. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, Cosy, the name given to a small kind of omnibus recently introduced.
2. A quilted covering placed over a tea-pot to retain the heat; more fully, tea-cosy. A similar covering to keep an egg warm, an egg-cosy.
[Known to me about 1848. F. Hall.]
1863. Tyndall, Heat, ix. § 342 (1870), 274. It is not unusual to preserve the heat of teapots by a woollen covering, but the ‘cosy’ must fit very loosely.
1886. Daily News, 28 Dec., 7/4. Advt., Cushions, Tea Coseys. Antimacassars, &c.
Comb. 1890. H. S. Hallett, 1000 Miles on Eleph. in Shan States, 250. We carried a cosie-covered Chinese teapot.
3. A cosy seat; spec. a canopied seat for two, occupying a corner of a room. [Called in F. causeuse, which has perhaps suggested cosy in English.]
1876. Green, Stray Stud., 65. The salon itself … is a pleasant room, gaily painted, with cosies all round it and a huge mass of gorgeous flowers in the centre.
