Link Centre Dictionary

cough

UK/kɒf/ US/kɔːf/ fairly common slang
verb (1) noun (2)

verb

1.

exhale abruptly, as when one has a chest cold or congestion

  • “The smoker coughs all day”

noun

1.

sudden expulsion of air from the lungs that clears the air passages; a common symptom of upper respiratory infection or bronchitis or pneumonia or tuberculosis

Synonyms
2.

the act of exhaling air suddenly with a noise

Synonyms

Origin

From Middle English coughen, coghen (“to cough; to vomit”) [and other forms], from Old English *cohhian (compare Old English cohhetan (“to bluster; to riot; to cough (?)”)), from Proto-West Germanic *kuh- (“to cough”), ultimately of onomatopoeic origin. Cognates * Middle Dutch cuchen (“to cough”) (modern Dutch kuchen (“to cough”); German Low German kuchen (“to cough”)) * Middle High German kûchen (“to breathe (on); to exhale”), kîchen (“to breathe with difficulty”) (modern German keichen, keuchen (“to breathe with difficulty; to gasp, pant”)) * Spanish cof (“coughing sound”) * West Frisian kiche (“to cough”), kochelje (“to cough persistently”)

Phrases

  • cough and a spit
  • cough attack
  • cough button
  • cough candy
  • cough capsule
  • cough down
  • cough drop
  • cough drug
  • cough expectorant
  • cough out
  • cough over
  • cough up

Related words

Word family

Broader terms

Narrower terms

See also

Parts

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.