quoit
English
WOTD – 18 February 2016
![](Images/wiktionary/Garden_Quoits.jpg.webp)
The equipment used for the game of deck-quoits. The quoits are the rings of rope.
![](Images/wiktionary/Ringtoss-quoit-game-ca1815.jpg.webp)
An 1817 fashion plate depicting three women and a man playing an inverse ring toss, in which they are tossing a quoit
Etymology
From Middle English coyte (“flat stone”), from Old French coite, from Latin culcita. Doublet of quilt.
Pronunciation
- (UK) IPA(key): /kɔɪt/
Audio (UK) (file)
- (US) IPA(key): /kɔɪt/, /kwɔɪt/
- (dialectal, obsolete) IPA(key): /kweɪt/[1]
- Rhymes: -ɔɪt
Noun
quoit (plural quoits)
- A flat disc of metal or stone thrown at a target in the game of quoits.
- 1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 4: Calypso]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], OCLC 560090630, part II [Odyssey], page 54:
- He heard then a warm heavy sigh, softer, as she turned over and the loose brass quoits of the bedstead jingled. Must get those settled really.
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- A ring of rubber or rope similarly used in the game of deck-quoits.
- The flat stone covering a cromlech.
- An ancient burial mound, synonymous with dolmen.
- The discus used in ancient sports.
Translations
flat disc thrown at a target
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Verb
quoit (third-person singular simple present quoits, present participle quoiting, simple past and past participle quoited)
- (intransitive) To play quoits.
- 1717, John Dryden, “Book I”, in Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], OCLC 731548838, page 20:
- Then, to preſerve the Fame of ſuch a deed, / For Python ſlain, he [Phoebus or Apollo] Pythian Games decreed. / Where Noble Youths for Maſterſhip ſhou'd ſtrive, / To Quoit, to Run, and Steeds and Chariots drive.
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- (transitive) To throw like quoit.
- 1791, Homer; W[illiam] Cowper, transl., “[The Iliad.] Book XXIII.”, in The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer, Translated into Blank Verse, […], volume I, London: […] J[oseph] Johnson, […], OCLC 779243096, lines 1038–1041, page 630:
- Each took / His ſtation, and Epeüs ſeized the clod. / He ſwung, he caſt it, and the Greecians laugh'd. / Leonteus, branch of Mars, quoited it next.
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References
- Bingham, Caleb (1808), “Improprieties in Pronunciation, common among the people of New-England”, in The Child's Companion; Being a Conciſe Spelling-book […] , 12th edition, Boston: Manning & Loring, OCLC 671561968, page 76.
Anagrams
- Quito, toqui