verb
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to treat with indulgence
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to cook (something, esp eggs) in water just below the boiling point
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of coddle
1590–1600; variant of caudle, v. use of caudle
Explanation
While it is okay for parents to coddle, spoil, or pamper a young child, it’s a little unnerving when parents coddle, or pamper adult children. And downright weird when adult children wear Pampers. Coddle is an old word. Originally, it meant to cook gently in water that is near boiling, as in coddling an egg. It most likely gained its association with pampering and taking care of someone via a drink made for invalids that was prepared by coddling. “Mollycoddle,” a synonym for coddle, originally meant a person who coddles himself, or an effeminate man.
Vocabulary lists containing coddle
Ender's Game
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Warriors Don't Cry
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Restart
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
What would become of the cook, and Ann Coddle?
From Richard Vandermarck by Harris, Miriam Coles
Ann Coddle no more fretted at me, but waited on me with alacrity.
From Richard Vandermarck by Harris, Miriam Coles
Murch was called 'Captain Snarl'; a tall, fierce-looking man, who just filled my idea of a Spanish freebooter, was 'Dr. Coddle.'
From A Study of Hawthorne by Lathrop, George Parsons
The regiment was encamped on Coddle Creek, near which time Colonel William Davidson, a Continental officer, was appointed to the command of a battalion.
From Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical by Hunter, C. L.
I was in great doubt about taking Ann Coddle; never having been out of the house without a person of that description in attendance before.
From Richard Vandermarck by Harris, Miriam Coles
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
