cockerel
nounUK /ˈkɒkəɹəl/ · US /ˈkɑkəɹəl/
Etymology From Middle English kokerel. By surface analysis, cock + -rel.
1
A young male chicken.
- “Mrs. Boast can’t have got all these from one hatching,” [Ma] said. “I do believe there’s not more than two cockerels among them.” “The Boasts have got such a head-start with chickens, likely they’re planning to eat friers this summer,” said Pa. “It may be she took a few cockerels out of this flock, looking on them as meat.”1941, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little Town on the Prairie:
- He had made arrangements with the cockerel to call him three-quarters of an hour earlier in the mornings instead of half an hour.1943 November – 1944 February (date written; published 1945 August 17), George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Animal Farm […], London: Secker & Warburg, published May 1962, →OCLC: