chough
nounUS, UK /t͡ʃʌf/ · AU, NZ /t͡ʃɐf/
Etymology From Middle English choughe, choȝe, coo, cheo, from Old English ċēo (“a bird of the genus Corvus, a jay, crow, jackdaw, chough”) and ċeahhe (“a daw”), both from Proto-West Germanic *kahu (“jackdaw, crow”), from imitative Proto-Indo-European *gewH- (“to crow, caw, shout”). Cognate with Scots kae (“jackdaw”), West Frisian ka (“jackdaw”), Dutch kauw (“jackdaw, daw, chough”), Swedish kaja (“jackdaw”).
1
Either of two species of bird of the genus Pyrrhocorax in the crow family Corvidae that breed mainly in high mountains and on coastal sea cliffs of Eurasia.
- For parot is no churlish Chowgh / nor no f[l]ekyd pyec. 1521, John Skelton, Speke Parrot, lines 205–210:
- And had not the old-man come in vvith a VVhoo-bub againſt his Daughter, and the Kings Sonne, and ſcar'd my Chovvghes from the Chaffe, I had not left a Purſe aliue in the vvhole Army.c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iv], page 296, column 2:
2
The white-winged chough, of genus Corcorax in the Australian mud-nest builders family, Corcoracidae, that inhabits dry woodlands.
- Derived terms
- alpine chough, red-billed chough, white-winged chough, yellow-billed chough