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Today's Word "Cockle"

A ribbed bivalve on

Published in Vocabulary

cockle \KAHK-ehl\ (noun) - 1 : A ribbed bivalve of the genus Cardium with traits of the clam and the scallop. 2 : A wild plant (Lychnis Githago) with a reddish or purplish flower common in cornfields. 3 : A pucker or imperfection in material (used as a verb, today's word means "to wrinkle or pucker," as a solution that cockles a piece of cloth).

"The lovely Janie Myerson cockled the brows of many at the reception with her cockled silk sheath cut low in the back."

 

This word comes from from Old French coquille "scallop, shell" from Latin conchylium "shellfish," itself borrowed from Greek "konkhylion," the diminutive of konkhe "cockle, mussel." The Latin equivalent of "konkhe" was concha "mussel, shellfish."


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