coxcomb

From Middle English cokke’s comb.

coxcomb (plural coxcombs)

1. (historical) The cap of a court jester, adorned with a red stripe.
2. The fleshy red pate of a rooster.
3. (by extension) A foolish or conceited person; a dandy.

   Synonyms: fool, popinjay

   • a. 1746, Jonathan Swift, “VII. Another, Written upon a Window where there was No Writing before.”, in Thomas Sheridan, compiler, The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, D.D., Dean of St. Patrick’s, Dublin. […] In Nineteen Volumes, new corrected and revised edition, volume VII, London: Printed [by Nichols and Son] for J[oseph] Johnson [et al.], published 1801, →OCLC, page 361:

     Thanks to my stars, I once can see / A window here from scribbling free! / Here no conceited coxcombs pass, / To scratch their paltry drabs on glass; / Nor party-fool is calling names, / Or dealing crowns to George and James.

   • 1749, Henry Fielding, chapter XIII, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume III, London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, book VII, page 112:

     [F]or tho' I am afraid the Doctor was a little of a Coxcomb, he might be nevertheleſs very much of a Surgeon.

   • 2010, Pseudonymous Bosch, This Isn't What It Looks Like:

     And she nearly started a fight between two young fops in plumed hats and flouncy collars: "Clay-brained coxcomb!" "Mewling milk-livered maggot!"

• (pate of a rooster): cockscomb

• coxcomb chart
• coxcombed
• coxcombic
• coxcombical
• coxcombically