Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Heraldry Lying down with the head raised.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Lying down; crouching; not erect.
- Sleeping in a place; staying.
- In heraldry, lying down with the head raised, which distinguishes the posture of couchant from that of dormant, or sleeping: applied to a lion or other beast. Some writers confuse couchant and dormant, and give the term sejant to the beast lying down with head raised; but this is rare. Also
harbored and lodged.
Wiktionary
- adj. of an animal Lying down; crouching.
- adj. heraldry Represented as lying down with the head raised.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Lying down with head erect; squatting.
- adj. (Her.) Lying down with the head raised, which distinguishes the posture of
couchant from that ofdormant , or sleeping; -- said of a lion or other beast.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. lying on the stomach with head raised with legs pointed forward
Etymologies
- From Middle French couchant. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English, from Old French, present participle of couchier, to lie down; see couch. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
““The crest is a Stag couchant, vulnerated through the neck by a broad arrow; on his side is a Martlett for a difference.””
“In the aisle stands another altar-tomb, which has the sides panelled and adorned with shields of arms and bears the figure of an earlier Sir Thomas Markenfield, clad in armour of the period between Poitiers and Agincourt, and wearing a very curious collar of park palings with a stag couchant in front, possibly”
“* And if descriptivism is rampant, would prescriptivism be "couchant"?”
“In Curzon's figure the lion is standing, not 'couchant', as stated by”
“a small pug-dog "couchant" before it, resolved to guard the treasure even at the sacrifice of life -- and a front-door standing invitingly half-open.”
“How one couchant beast, with its imperturbable gravitas, a heraldic chunk of London itself, moved without lifting a paw, from the site on the south bank of the Thames being cleared for the Festival of Britain in 1951, to Waterloo Station with its martial trappings, and on to its present eminence alongside the decommissioned County Hall.”
“Lorsque au soleil couchant les rivières sont roses”
“I asked, peering at the crest, with its faded leopard couchant, and the printing below, more legible than the handwriting.”
“In one courtyard, a mangy, flea-ridden griffon lay couchant, chained to the wall, flies buzzing around its slow-blinking head.”
Simon & Schuster: Jasper Dash and the Flame-Pits of Delaware
“The entrance to the port is still guarded by the marble statues of the two couchant lions from which it took its name, though they are now half-buried in alluvial earth, symbols of the illustrious city that Herodotus called "the glory of Ionia.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘couchant’.
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phrontistery - c
from phrontistery.info
caballine, cabas, cable, caboched, cabochon, caboose, cabotage, cabré, cabrie, cabriole, cabriolet, cacaesthesia and 1298 more...
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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Heraldica
any and all things heraldry related.
tressure, trefoil, estoile, ermine, fesse, gules, azure, bend, bendlet, escutcheon, passant guardant, or and 58 more...
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Take it lying down
And get up with fleas.
recumbent, accumbent, procumbent, cumbent, recline, prone, decumbent, couchant, recouchant, supine, prostrate, laid out and 2 more...
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Clarissa, Or, The History of a Young ...
These words are from Samuel Richardson's novel Clarissa, Or, The History of a Young Lady, 1747-48
adumbrate, virago, varlet, rencounter, akimbo, palliate, amanuensis, amok, equipage, cully, se'ennight, resentments and 560 more...
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Vocabulary
Words I come across while reading.
talus, echelon, onanistic, cabochon, avocation, charnel, moue, portentous, prolixity, astringent, hoary, patina and 165 more...
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List of Heraldry Terms
Words and phrases used in blazoning heraldic devices, along with names and other terms associated with the art and science.
Other similar lists can be found on Wordnik, especially that...seiant, duciper, bourdon, pouch, scrip, staff, ananas, besant d'argent, roundle, roundel, argent, allocamelus and 743 more...
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Heraldry
azure, gules, sable, vert, purpure, or, argent, ermine, vair, charge, ordinary, cross and 118 more...
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wordhoard
dilatory, ataraxia, hermit, cabana, hut, dome, vestigial, porcine, crapulous, usufruct, curmudgeon, bombastic and 229 more...
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The Ingenious Hidalgo Don Quixote of ...
Words I met while reading Cervantes' story.
lance, hale, lanthorn-jaws, knight-errantry, nay, expostulate, puling, massy, agreeable delusions, pasteboard, bestrid, sallied and 148 more...
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Adjectival Arcana
A roster of adjectives that infrequently surface in typical conversation and writing. Many are dredged from scientific or other technical jargon or sieved from examples of disused archaic forms.
unitegmic, acaulescent, reticuloendothelial, ingressive, uniate, acanthopterygian, ossific, epiphysial, perivisceral, acœlomatous, cestoid, acælomate and 7756 more...
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Onager's Words
soubrette, evocative, coup de theatre, infarct, noesis, quechua, vox angelica, muzzy, fastigiate, hagridden, kwoc, pellucid and 19 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for couchant.
minerva Then these little sly rogues, how they lie couchant, ready to spring upon us harmless fellows the moment we are in their reach!
Lovelace to Belford, Clarissa by Samuel Richardson Dec 15, 2007