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cosset

[kos-it]
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verb (used with object)
  1. to treat as a pet; pamper; coddle.
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noun
  1. a lamb brought up without its dam; pet lamb.
  2. any pet.
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Origin of cosset

1570–80; akin to Old English cossetung kissing, verbal noun based on *cossettan to kiss, derivative of coss kiss
Related formsun·cos·set·ed, adjective
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Examples from the Web for cosseting

Contemporary Examples

Historical Examples

  • I think you're cosseting me up altogether and I don't like the white bread so well!

    Hortus Inclusus

    John Ruskin

  • First of all there was the usual ceremony of “cosseting” and drying tears.

    Tom, Dick and Harry

    Talbot Baines Reed

  • But it seemed to Maurice that he needed as much attention and cosseting as a woman.

    The Graftons

    Archibald Marshall

  • She is the very soul of impartiality; but there is no cosseting.

  • But cosseting and coddling in a warm house will never restore me.

    An Alabaster Box

    Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley

British Dictionary definitions for cosseting

cosset

verb -sets, -seting or -seted (tr)
  1. to pamper; coddle; pet
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noun
  1. any pet animal, esp a lamb
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Word Origin

C16: of unknown origin
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for cosseting

cosset

v.

1650s, "to fondle, caress, indulge," from a noun (1570s) meaning "lamb brought up as a pet" (applied to persons from 1590s), perhaps from Old English cot-sæta "one who dwells in a cot." Related: Coseted; coseting. Cf. German Hauslamm, Italian casiccio.

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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper