Forms: α. 6 cocus, 6–7 cocos; β. 6–7 coquo, (6 caco, coeco), 6– coco; γ. 7 coquer, cocar, cocker, 7–8 cokar, 7– coker; δ. 8–9 cocoa. [a. Pg. and Sp. coco; in 16th c. L. cocus. The early writers, from Cosmas 545 to the 15th c., knew it only as the Indian nut or ‘nut of India’; coquos (plural) is quoted first from the Roteiro de Vasco da Gama (Portuguese, 1498–9); Barbosa 1516, has (Pg.) quoquos; Pigafetta 1519 has (It.) coche pl. of coca; Oviedo 1526, Barros 1553, Garcia 1563, and Acosta 1578, have coco; Correa 1561 coquo.
The Portuguese and Spanish authors of the 16th c. agree in identifying the word with Pg. and Sp. coco ‘grinning face, grin, grimace,’ also ‘bugbear, scarecrow,’ cognate with cocar ‘to grin, make a grimace’; the name being said to refer to the face-like appearance of the base of the shell, with its three holes. Historical evidence favors the European origin of the name, for there is nothing similar in any of the languages of India, where the Portuguese first found the fruit; and indeed Barbosa, Barros, and Garcia, in mentioning the Malayalam name tenga, and Canarese narle, expressly say ‘we call these fruits quoquos,’ ‘our people have given it the name of coco,’ ‘that which we call coco, and the Malabars temga.’
In Eng. the latinized form cocus, afterwards (as in Bot. Latin) cocos, was at first used, both for sing. and plural. Towards the close of the 16th c. coquo, coco, as ‘the Portingalls cal this fruit’ (Linschoten), began to be used, with pl. cocos, cocoes. Coco remained the established spelling in the 18th c., till the publication of Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary, in which the article Coco was (app. by some accident, for Johnson in his own writings used coco, pl. cocoes) run together with the article Cocoa (= Cacao); this gave currency to a confusion between the two words which still prevails, although careful writers have never ceased to use the correct form coco.
Another spelling, coker, has been used, with various modifications since about 1620 (Purchas has cokers, Burton coquer-nuts); it appears to be from 17th c. Dutch koker-noot, and has long been in commercial use at the port of London to avoid the ambiguity of cocoa.
The Greek words κοῦκι and κόιξ applied by Theophrastus, and, after him, by Pliny (cūci, coix), to certain palmaceous trees, have both been suggested as sources of the name, but without any ground, except their distant resemblance to coco. Connection with Sp. coca, F. coche, and the family of L. concha shell is also philologically untenable.]
† 1. = COCO-NUT below. Obs.
α. 1555. Eden, Decades W. Indies, 194 (trans. Oviedo). This frute was cauled Cocus [the Italian version, Venice 1534, here translated, has coco] for this cause, that, when it is taken from the place where it cleaueth … there are seene two holes, and aboue them two other naturall holes, which altogether, doo represent the gesture and fygure of the cattes cauled Mammone, that is munkeys, when they crye: which crye the Indians caule coca.
1579. T. Stevens, in Hakluyt, Voy. (1589), 162. Wine of the Palme tree or of a fruite called Cocos.
1598. trans. Linschoten, lvi. 100/1. The Indian nuts called Cocus. Ibid., 101/1. These Cocus being yet in their husks may be carried ouer the whole world.
a. 1600. Hakluyt, Voy., III. 749. We found also a tree which beareth the fruite Cocos, which is bigger than a man’s head, having within the utter coate, which is about 3 inches thicke, a certaine nut as bigge as two fists.
1605. Sylvester, Du Bartas, I. iii. (1641), 28/1. Th’ Ile of Zebut’s admirable Tree Beareth a fruit call’d Cocos commonly.
β. 1582. N. Lichefield, trans. Castanheda’s Conq. E. Ind., 146. Cayro is the caske or rind of a nut they have in the India called Caco.
1598. trans. Pigafetta’s Congo, in Harl. Coll., II. 553. The Indian nuts called coccos, because they have within them a certain shell that is like an ape.
1598. trans. Linschoten, lvi. 100/1. Vnder the leaues, close to the tree, grow the Coquos together.
1599. Hakluyt, Voy., II. i. 251. Cayro which is threede made of the huske of Cocoes.
1686. Lond. Gaz., No. 2186/1. 12 Thousand Cocos with Balzome.
1708. Phil. Trans., XXVI. 191. They eat Coco’s very freely.
1716. T. Ward, Eng. Ref., 60. Tho’ the Indians know no other Bread but of Cocoe.
1740. Johnson, Life Drake, in Gentl. Mag., X. 510. The Vallies extremely fruitful, and abounding with ripe Figs, Cocoes, and Plantains.
2. The tropical palm-tree Cocos nucifera, which produces the coco-nut. More fully called coco-palm, coco-tree, and now more often coco(a)-nut tree.
Its native region is app. the tropical shores of the Indian and Pacific Oceans; nowhere indigenous in the Atlantic basin. ‘It seems certain that it was introduced by the Portuguese into Western Africa and the Cape Verde islands, and that it did not exist in the West Indies, Guiana or Brazil at the time of the discovery of America.’ Brande, Forest Flora of N.W. and Central India, 557.
α. 1555. Eden, Decades W. Ind., 194. A certeyne tree cauled Cocus beinge a kynd of date trees.
β. 1744. J. Harris, Collect. Voy., I. 56. Trees, which they guessed to be Cocos, and Palmitos.
1864. Tennyson, Enoch Arden, 575. The slender coco’s drooping crown of plumes.
γ. 1621–30. [see COCO-NUT 4].
1681. R. Knox, Hist. Ceylon, 15. These Leaves all grow on the top of the Tree after the manner of a Coker.
1712. trans. Pomet’s Hist. Drugs, I. 137. The Cokar furnishes the Work-Men with considerable Business.
δ. 1744. Thomson, Seasons, Summer, 667. O let me drain the Cocoa’s milky Bowl.
1755. Johnson, Cocoa.
1810. Southey, Kehama, IV. i. Reclined beneath a Cocoa’s feathery shade.
3. attrib. and Comb. Coco-palm, coco-tree = sense 2; so coco-garden; coco-fibre, the fiber of the coco-nut husk; so † coco-cup = coco-nut cup, coco-cordage, -milk, etc.
1598. trans. Linschoten, lvi. 101/1. They put some of theer Cocus milk into it.
1613. Purchas, Pilgr., V. xii. The Coquo-tree being the most profitable tree in the world.
1615. Sir T. Roe, Jrnl. in Collect. Voy. & Trav., 1752, I. 627/1. Junks … built, calk’d and rigged all out of the coco tree.
1630. Capt. Smith, Trav. & Adv., xix. 37–8. [Elephants] will shake a great Cocar tree for the nuts.
1704. Collect. Voy. (Churchill), III. 719/2. Some Portugueses being got into a Coco-Garden.
1710. Steele, Tatler, No. 245, ¶ 2. Two Coco Cups.
1812. Southey, Omniana, I. 141 (heading), Cocoa Cordage.
1855. J. F. Johnston, Chem. Com. Life, I. 267. The cocoa palm … produces the palm wine, known in India and the Pacific by the name of toddy.
1881. Athenæum, 24 Sept., 405/3. Coco-palm is the only correct way of spelling the name.
1883. Daily News, 14 Sept., 2/7. A building … used as cocoa-fibre manufactory.
4. Coco-nut, cocoa-nat, coker-nut.
a. The nut or seed of the coco-palm; = COCO 1. (Formerly cocoa-nut meant the cocoa-bean: see COCOA 4.)
β. 1613. Purchas, Pilgr., V. xiii. 437. Her chamber for the Palme, or Coquo-Nuts.
1662. Pepys, Diary, 16 July. I seeming to like a ring made of a coco-nutt with a stone done in it.
1712. E. Cooke, Voy. S. Sea, 255. A Sort of Chesnuts, Coco-Nuts, Dates, &c.
1748. Anson’s Voy., II. v. 177. Her loading consisted of timber, cocao, coco-nuts.
1844. Hull Dock Act, 121. Coco-nuts, per 100, 3d.
1852. Balfour, Class-bk. Bot., 263. In the Coco-nut, in place of fleshy cells, woody fibrous ones are produced.
γ. 1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., I. ii. II. iii. (1651), 77. One tree yields them Coquernuts.
1630. Capt. Smith, Trav. & Adv., xix. 38. Cocar nuts and berries.
1635. Heywood, Philocothonista, 45. Cups made of … Cocker-nutts.
1681. R. Knox, Hist. Ceylon, 14. Here are also … Coker-nuts; Plantins also and Banana’s.
1712. trans. Pomet’s Hist. Drugs, I. 137. The Cokar-Nut … grows in the Spanish West-Indies.
1851. Mayhew, Lond. Labour, I. 89/2. Coker-nuts—as they are now generally called, and indeed ‘entered’ as such at the Custom-house, and so written by Mr. Mc Culloch, to distinguish them from cocoa.
δ. 1781. Cowper, Lett., Aug. Wks. (1876), 79. We felt ourselves … obliged to you for the cocoa-nuts.
1870. Yeats, Nat. Hist. Comm., 190. The cocoa-nut forms a considerable article of export from many of our colonies.
b. Used for coco-nut palm.
1852. Balfour, Class-bk. Bot., 993. Certain palms are associated in large groups, as the Coco-nut.
1859. Tennent, Ceylon, I. 109. At the head of these palms is the Coco-nut.
c. In pugilistic slang, and humorously: The human head. (Cf. nut.)
1873. Slang Dict., Cocoa-nut, the head. A pugilistic term.
1885. Mrs. Lynn Linton, Christ. Kirkland, I. x. 269. You need not bother that silly cocoanut of yours.
d. attrib. or Comb., as coco-nut cup, fibre, man, palm, shell, tree; coco-nut butter (see quot. 1890); coco-nut matting, matting made of the fiber of the outer husk of the coco-nut; coco-nut oil, a whitish oil or fat obtained from the coco-nut.
1664. Escaliot, in Sir T. Browne, Wks. (1852), III. 519. Cords made of coconutt rinde.
1682. Lond. Gaz., No. 1721/1. His Excellency Presented her Highness … with 6 Silver Fillagreen Stands, made in the Indies, with Coco-nut Cups set in Fillagreen.
1691. Ray, Creation, II. (1704), 240. The Coco or Coker-nut Tree.
1702. Lond. Gaz., No. 3806/8. Two large Coco Nut Cups footed and tipt with Silver.
1707. W. Funnell, Voy. Round World, iii. 60. The Coco-nut-Trees are from 50 to 60, 70, 80 and 100 Foot in height, mostly slender and streight.
1768. Rose, in Phil. Trans., LX. 445. Their chief instrument being a large cocoa nut-shell, strung with guts, and somewhat resembling a guittar.
1838. T. Thomson, Chem. Org. Bodies, 442. Cocoa-nut oil. This oil is obtained by expression from the kernel of the cocoa-nut.
1852. Balfour, Class-bk. Bot., 936. The coco-nut palm.
1861. Cleghorn, in Edin. New Philos. Jrnl., xiv. On the Coco-nut tree and its uses.
1863–72. Watts, Dict. Chem., Cocoa-nut oil … is imported in large quantities into Europe for the manufacture of soap.
1889. Catholic News, 15 June, 5/5. On Epsom Downs … a gipsy, a cocoa-nut man, and some book-makers.
1890. The Grocer, Feb. 8. In Amsterdam a factory is being started for the purpose of extracting from cocoa-nuts a substance styled cocoa-nut butter.
5. Double Coco-nut, in Fr. coco-de-mer, coco-des-Maldives, the immense woody nut of a gigantic palm Lodoicea sechellarum, found native only on the small islands, Praslin and Curieuse, of the Seychelles group. The fruit weighs 40 or 50 pounds, is covered with a thick fibrous husk, and contains from one to three stones, or ‘nuts,’ about 28 inches long, covered with excessively hard and thick black shells, each divided half-way down into two lobes, whence the name.
Before the discovery of these islands in 1743, the source of these nuts, which were often found floating on the Indian Ocean, or thrown up on the shores of the Maldive Islands, was enveloped in mystery and fable.
1827. Hooker, in Curtis’s Bot. Mag., LIV. 2734. Of all the palms perhaps that which for a long time has been the least perfectly known, and yet the most extensively celebrated, is … the Double Cocoa-nut.
1857. Henfrey, Bot., 393. Large hollow double or triple nuts, of the same character as the Cocoa nut … the ‘Double Cocoa-nuts’ of the Seychelle Islands.
6. Sea Coco-nut of Jamaica: the fruit of Manicaria Plukenetii a palm of Trinidad and the adjacent mainland, often washed ashore at Jamaica. Called also Sea Apple, Fr. petit coco de mer.
Coco2: see COCCO.
