Etymologically
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coop

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Pronunciation

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English coupe, also cupe, a basket,[2][3][4] spelled cowpe or coupe from the 15th to the 17th century.[3] The OED points to an unrecorded inherited from Old English *cūpe, a doublet of cȳpe (“cask, bushel, basket”),[3][5][6] and Merriam-Webster also relates it to that word, the source of kipe.[7] It corresponds to Middle Dutch cūpe, Middle Low German kūpe (“basket, tub”) and Dutch kuip (“tub, vat”), and to Old Saxon kōpa, Old High German chuofa and German Kufe (“cask”),[3][4][8] and Barnhart also lists Norwegian kupe, Swedish kupa and Icelandic kúpa (“bowl, hive, vessel”).[5] Most dictionaries trace the group to Latin cūpa (“tub, cask”), in medieval Latin also cōpa,[3][8][4][9][5][6][10] the source of cup and cupola;[9][11] the OED notes that a Latin origin makes the umlaut of cȳpe hard to explain.[3] The American Heritage Dictionary derives the Middle English word possibly from the Middle Dutch one,[11] and Collins probably from the Middle Low German one;[12] Dictionary.com suggests a Scandinavian source, comparing Norwegian kaup (“wooden can”).[13] Etymonline traces the Latin word to Proto-Indo-European *keup- (“hollow mound”).[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

A basket: before 1300, in “Floris and Blauncheflur”, a sense that died out after the 14th century;[3] Barnhart dates cupe, a wicker basket, to about 1250.[5] The MED glosses it as a large wicker basket or pannier.[2]

Semantic evolution

The MED already has the sense "a coop or house for chickens",[2] and Barnhart's first record of cowpe for a chicken coop is from 1342;[5] Etymonline dates "small cage for poultry" to the mid-14th century.[9] The OED's first quotation for a basket put over sitting or fattening fowls is from before 1500, and Word Origins describes the medieval coop as such a basket.[3][14] A wicker basket for catching fish, also called a kipe, is recorded from 1469 in a Scottish act,[3] and Wright's dialect dictionary still has it as a vessel of twigs used for fishing on the Humber.[15] Johnson (1755) defined coop first as a barrel for liquids and then as a cage or pen for poultry or sheep.[16] From 1579, in Spenser, a coop could be any narrow place of confinement,[3] and in slang a prison from 1785;[3][17] in northern English, Lincolnshire, Shropshire and Isle of Wight dialect it was any close place of confinement, a chicken hutch, a rabbit pen or a prison.[15] The verb, to shut up in a coop or a narrow space, is recorded from 1570 in the OED,[3] the 1560s in Etymonline[9] and between 1563 and 1587, in an edition of Foxe's Book of Martyrs, in Barnhart.[5] In 19th-century American political slang voters were "cooped", held under guard before an election, and the place where they were kept was a coop.[3][7] American slang also used coop for the head (1908), for hiding or staying somewhere (1877), and in New York police slang for sleeping while on duty.[17]

Timeline

  • c. 1250 – cupe, a wicker basket.[5]
  • before 1300 – a basket (obsolete after the 14th century).[3]
  • 1342 – cowpe, a coop for chickens.[5]
  • 1469 – a wicker basket for catching fish.[3]
  • before 1500 – a wicker basket or cage for poultry.[3]
  • 1570 – verb, to confine people in a small space.[3]
  • 1579 – a narrow place of confinement (Spenser).[3]
  • 1597 – verb, to put poultry in a coop.[3]
  • 1745 – a protective grating round a tree.[3]
  • 1785 – slang, a prison.[3][17]
  • 1889 – American political slang, the place where voters were cooped.[3]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A cage, pen or small building for poultry or other small animals: a coop for the ducks behind the barn.[7][12][3]
  2. A small, cramped place of confinement, or in slang a jail or prison cell.[12][7][3][17]
  3. A wicker basket for catching fish.[12][3]
  4. A badly built, ramshackle structure with cracks or holes in its walls.[7]
  5. fly the coop: (slang) to leave suddenly or secretly; to escape.[7]

Verb

  1. To put or keep in a coop; to pen: often with up.[7][3][8]
  2. To confine in a small or crowded space: The children were cooped up indoors all week.[7][12][8]
  3. To restrain or hold back: a mind cooped up by habit.[7]
  4. (US slang, historical) To hold voters in seclusion under guard before an election.[7][3]
  5. (US police slang) To sleep or rest while on duty.[17]

Word family

  • uncoop

References

  1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
  3. ^ 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  8. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  10. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  11. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  12. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  13. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  14. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  15. ^ a b 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)
  16. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  17. ^ a b c d e Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com