coney

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English coni, also coning, cunin and conyng,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Anglo-Norman coniz (“rabbits”), the plural of conil (“rabbit”).^{[2][5][6][3][7]} The OED explains the English word partly from that plural taken as a singular, partly from an Anglo-Norman singular coni made from it, and partly from Old French conin, a form of conil with a different suffix;^[5] Barnhart and the Oxford Dictionary of English take it from the forms in “-in”.^[4][8] The French word is from Latin cunīculus (“rabbit; burrow, underground passage”),^{[5][2][6][3][9]} which ancient writers such as Pliny called a Spanish word;^[5][2] it is generally thought to be of Iberian origin.^{[6][3][9][10]} Merriam-Webster and Barnhart compare Basque untxi (“rabbit”).^[3][4] The Latin word is also the source of conejo, coelho, coniglio, conill and conilh,^[2][5] and the French form in “-in” of conijn, konijn and Kaninchen.^[5][2] As the rabbit was not native to northern Europe, there was no Germanic word for it;^[2][9][10] Welsh cwning, Irish coinnín and Scottish Gaelic coinean come from English or Anglo-Norman.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The skin or fur of a rabbit: before 1200, in the Poema Morale.^[5][9] The OED and Ayto note that the word is recorded for the fur before the animal, which appears before 1350;^[5][9] Barnhart dates the word to about 1175 and the spelling cony to before 1338, in Mannyng's Chronicle.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Rabbits were farmed in England from the 12th and 13th centuries, and the word long named the animal as hunted, bred and eaten.^[5] The word rabbit, first used in the 14th century for the young, gradually replaced it as the general name in the 19th century;^[2][9] Etymonline links the change to slang use of coney as a punning synonym for cunny.^[2] In the Wycliffite Bible and later translations the word rendered the Hebrew name of the rock hyrax,^[5][2][10] and it was given from 1555 to small New World animals such as the guinea pig, the agouti and the pika.^[5] As a word for a person it was a term of endearment by 1529, in Skelton;^[5] from 1591, in Robert Greene's pamphlets on coney-catching, it meant the victim of a swindler.^[5][2] The OED's pronunciation history shows the old vowel of honey and money, in rhyme from the 16th to the 18th century; the present long o became usual in the 19th century, perhaps as a spelling pronunciation for the biblical animal and to avoid the indecent association.^[5][2][10]

Timeline

• before 1200 – the skin or fur of a rabbit.^[5]
• before 1350 – a rabbit, as hunted or bred for food.^[5]
• c. 1395 – a hyrax, in the Wycliffite Bible.^[5]
• before 1450 – the flesh of a rabbit as food.^[5]
• 1529 – a term of endearment, in Skelton.^[5]
• 1555 – a small New World mammal, such as the guinea pig or agouti.^[5]
• 1591 – the dupe of a swindler, in Greene.^[5]
• 1598 – heraldry, a representation of a rabbit.^[5]
• 1855 – a garment of rabbit fur.^[5]
• 1884 – a small grouper of the Caribbean and western Atlantic.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A rabbit, especially the European rabbit; now chiefly regional or heraldic.^{[3][6][7][11]}
2. The fur or skin of a rabbit, or a garment made from it.^[3][6][7][5]
3. A hyrax, especially the rock hyrax of the Bible.^[3][6][7][5]
4. A pika.^[3][6][7]
5. A small grouper of the tropical Atlantic.^[3][6][5]
6. (archaic) A dupe or simpleton.^[3][7][5]

Related words

• rabbit
• cunny
• Coney Island
• coney-catcher

Usage notes

The word is also spelled cony.^[7][3][11] In 19th-century dialect it was still the word for a rabbit or a rabbit skin in Scotland, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, East Anglia, Kent, Sussex, Wiltshire and Cornwall.^[12] The OED also has coney as short for Coney Island and a hot dog sold there (1902),^[5] and in American underworld slang coney was counterfeit paper money (1823).^[13]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g h The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
7. ^ a b c d e f g Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
8. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c d e f Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
10. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
11. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
13. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com