cockle
1 Americannoun
-
any bivalve mollusk of the genus Cardium, having somewhat heart-shaped, radially ribbed valves, especially C. edule, the common edible species of Europe.
-
any of various allied or similar mollusks.
-
a cockle in fabric.
-
a small, crisp candy of sugar and flour, bearing a motto.
verb (used without object)
-
cockles,
present (3rd person singular)
-
cockled,
past participle, past
-
cockling
present participle
verb (used with object)
-
cockles,
present (3rd person singular)
-
cockled,
past participle, past
-
cockling
present participle
idioms
noun
noun
-
any sand-burrowing bivalve mollusc of the family Cardiidae, esp Cardium edule ( edible cockle ) of Europe, typically having a rounded shell with radiating ribs
-
any of certain similar or related molluscs
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short for cockleshell
-
a wrinkle or puckering, as in cloth or paper
-
a small furnace or stove
-
one's deepest feelings (esp in the phrase warm the cockles of one's heart )
verb
noun
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
cocklesimple
-
cocklessimple
-
have cockledperfect
-
has cockledperfect
-
am cocklingprogressive
-
are cocklingprogressive
-
is cocklingprogressive
-
have been cocklingperfect progressive
-
has been cocklingperfect progressive
Past
-
cockledsimple
-
had cockledperfect
-
was cocklingprogressive
-
were cocklingprogressive
-
had been cocklingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of cockle1
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English cokel, cokil(le), from Old French coquille, “shell, shell of a mollusk, mollusk,” from Vulgar Latin cocchīlia (unattested), from Latin conchylia, plural of conchȳlium, from Greek konchȳ́lion, equivalent to konchȳ́l(ē) “mussel, cockle” + -ion diminutive suffix; compare Old English -cocc in sǣ-cocc literally, “sea-cockle” from Vulgar Latin coccus (unattested) for Latin concha conch
Origin of cockle2
First recorded before 1000; Middle English cok(k)el, Old English coccel; further origin uncertain; perhaps from Late Latin cocculus (unattested), diminutive of coccus “berry, seed” ( see coccus ( def. ))
Vocabulary lists containing cockle
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.
See Examples For:
Scallop on a cauliflower purée bed and cockle popcorn and chorizo crumb.
From BBC ● Sep. 9, 2023
“When our team went back a year later, it was just covered in cockle shells,” Barber said.
From Seattle Times ● May 22, 2023
“This tells us that all of those nearly identical cancers came from a single cockle in the past,” Metzger said.
From Seattle Times ● May 22, 2023
Shell Beach is made up of billions of shells, specifically cockle shells that breed unchecked due to the high salinity of the water and the lack of predators able to survive in all that salt.
From The Guardian ● Dec. 23, 2017
Naturalists call them the nest of the cockle.
From Nooks and Corners of the New England Coast by Samuel Adams Drake
The cold-natured among us can warm their cockles with the heated steering wheel, heated front and rear seats and radiant leg warmers built into the Touring package.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 19, 2026
She was also the subject of a traditional folk song, which tells the story of a fishmongers' daughter who sold cockles and mussels from a wheelbarrow.
From BBC ● Apr. 2, 2025
And the vision of Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought or, indeed, Elon Musk being frog-marched off to the hoosegow will warm the cockles of many a heart.
From Slate ● Feb. 13, 2025
The team said more work is needed to understand what, if anything, the heart cockles are doing with this image projection superpower.
From Science Daily ● Dec. 2, 2024
“Bit o' news to warm the cockles of yer hearts.”
From "Black Swan Green" by David Mitchell
Gay writes: "Showers soon drench the camblet's cockled grain."
From The Journal to Stella by Jonathan Swift
Plancine's swimming eyes looked down, looked upon a litter of perished rags of paper, and, lying in the midst of the rubbish, an ancient stained and cockled miniature of a powdered Louis Seize coquette.
From At a Winter's Fire by Bernard Edward Joseph Capes
By them the oarage of the wind was taught, And how the quick tail steered the cockled boat.
From Poems New and Old by John Freeman
I never grew weary, either, of gathering stately and graceful green ferns, and finding them all "cockled up," as the phrase went, when I got home.
From Autumn Leaves Original Pieces in Prose and Verse by Anne Wales Abbot
Even in the bedroom there were embroidered pin-cushions, landscapes in cross-stitch, and crosses in folded paper, so elaborately cockled as to show the senseless labor they had cost.
From The Commission in Lunacy by Honoré de Balzac
It is 10 years since the Morecambe Bay cockling tragedy when the notorious tides and channels claimed the lives of 23 Chinese cockle workers.
From BBC ● Feb. 3, 2014
I thought all this, and I believe my companions had very similar thoughts as we danced up and down on the short cockling sea.
From Devon Boys A Tale of the North Shore by Gordon Browne
Will you want me, uncle? because, if not, I shall go out early with Bill Corbett cockling.
From A Chapter of Adventures by G. A. (George Alfred) Henty
More in the foreground, in the same direction, there spreads a troubled cockling sea of the Great Conglomerate.
From The Cruise of the Betsey or, A Summer Ramble Among the Fossiliferous Deposits of the Hebrides. With Rambles of a Geologist or, Ten Thousand Miles Over the Fossiliferous Deposits of Scotland by W. S. (William Samuel) Symonds
The book may now be shut up if a waterproof sheet is put at each end to prevent the damp of the cover from cockling the paper.
From Bookbinding, and the Care of Books A handbook for Amateurs, Bookbinders & Librarians by Noel Rooke
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