cot

1 of 3

noun (1)

ˈkät 

1

: a small house

2

: cover, sheath

especially : stall sense 4

cot

2 of 3

noun (2)

1

: a small usually collapsible bed often of fabric stretched on a frame

2

British : crib sense 2b

cot

3 of 3

abbreviation

cotangent

Examples of cot in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Noun

Signature Camp trips include lodging in tents, with group cooking gear, cots and sleeping pads provided. —Michael Salerno, USA TODAY, 24 Mar. 2024

And the cafeteria looks like an evacuation center after a natural disaster, with rows of cots. —Petula Dvorak, Washington Post, 3 Mar. 2024

They should also be allowed a cot for sleeping and allowed protection from rain and wind. —The San Diego Union-Tribune Staff, San Diego Union-Tribune, 20 Feb. 2024

In neighboring Zambia, inside the 60,000-seat National Heroes Stadium in the capital, Lusaka, rows of gray cots lined rooms at a makeshift treatment center where 24-year-old Memory Musonda had died. —Jeffrey Moyo, New York Times, 13 Feb. 2024

If there is no availability, the agency must let people remain in the shelter and use air mattresses, cots or other accommodations, or find another bed and arrange transportation to that shelter. —Nushrat Rahman, Detroit Free Press, 19 Jan. 2024

There was a storage room for the year’s supply of corn—to sell, or to grind for the family’s tortillas—and, untouched all this time, the room where his son had lived: a sagging cot, a chair, some fading photographs and posters on the wall. —Alma Guillermoprieto, The New Yorker, 4 Mar. 2024

At a treatment facility set up at a school in a dense suburb of Harare, nurses wearing latex gloves tended to patients splayed on cots. —Jeffrey Moyo, New York Times, 13 Feb. 2024

Modern cots are lightweight, comfortable and break down to a manageable size for stowing. —Idaho Statesman, 31 Jan. 2024

Word History

Etymology

Noun (1)

Middle English, "dwelling of a rural laborer, cottage, hut," going back to Old English cot (neuter a-stem) "dwelling of a rural laborer, bedchamber," going back to Germanic *kuta- "shelter" (whence also Middle Dutch cot "hut, hovel, pen for animals," Old Icelandic kot "hut, cottage"), of uncertain origin

Note: Alongside Old English cot is cote, a feminine weak noun (see cote entry 1). The Dictionary of Old English and Middle English Dictionary collapse the entries for the two words, and, in fact, it is not always possible to assign inflected forms to one or the other. The Oxford English Dictionary, on the other hand, keeps them separate, though it notes that definite attestations of cot are very meager between Old English and early Modern English. The lemma for the words in the Dictionary of Old English is cott, cotte, but the geminate spellings only occur in the Lindisfarne Gospels, and would seem to be of purely graphic significance. The sense "bedchamber" (translating Latin cubile and cubiculum) occurs only in the Lindisfarne and Rushworth Gospels. — The Germanic noun appears to be the zero-grade form of a root attested in other grades, as suggested by G. Kroonen (Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic) and elsewhere; compare Old English cyte "monastic cell, shepherd's hut" (for *cīete), central German regional/dialect Kötze "basket for carrying on the shoulders, pannier," Norwegian køyta "wickerwork hut" (from *kautjōn-?); central German Kietze, Kitze "bark container, pannier" (from *keutja/ō-?). (Kroonen also adduces Kiez/Kietz, originally "place where fishermen live," now "district of a city, red-light district," but as this word was native to northeastern Germany, a source with High German consonantism is unlikely.) Comparisons beyond Germanic are uncertain. If proto-Finno-Ugric *kota is relevant (compare Finnish kota "hut, house," Hungarian ház "house"), a European substratal origin is possible, though its introduction into Germanic would have to postdate Grimm's law.

Noun (2)

Hindi & Urdu khāṭ bedstead, from Sanskrit khaṭvā, perhaps of Dravidian origin; akin to Tamil kaṭṭil bedstead

First Known Use

Noun (1)

before the 12th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Noun (2)

1634, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Phrases Containing cot

• carry-cot
• cot death

Kids Definition

cot

1 of 2 noun

ˈkät 

: cottage sense 1

cot

2 of 2 noun

: a narrow bed often made of fabric stretched over a folding frame

Etymology

Noun

Old English cot "cottage"

Noun

from Hindi and Urdu khāt "frame of a bed"

Medical Definition

cot

1 of 2 noun

ˈkät 

: a protective cover for a finger

called also fingerstall

cot

2 of 2 noun

: a wheeled stretcher for hospital, mortuary, or ambulance service