uncowl

uncowl

English

Etymology

un- +‎ cowl

Verb

uncowl (third-person singular simple present uncowls, present participle uncowling, simple past and past participle uncowled)

1. (transitive) To divest or deprive of a cowl (monk's hood or hooded robe).
   • 1728, [Alexander Pope], “Book the Third”, in The Dunciad. An Heroic Poem. […], Dublin; London: […] A. Dodd, OCLC 1033416756, page 41:

     See’st thou an Isle, by Palmers, Pilgrims trod,
     Men bearded, bald, cowl’d, uncowl’d, shod, unshod,

   • 1849, L. Mariotti, Italy, Past and Present, London: Chapman, Volume 2, Chapter 11, pp. 389-399,

     Can the pope, to say nothing of himself and his cardinals, do away with his four archbishops and ninety-eight bishops? Will he reduce the prodigious number of his priests, who muster as strong as one twenty-eighth of the population? Will he uncowl his monks, two thousand and twenty-three of whom swarm about the streets of Rome alone?

2. (transitive, figurative, archaic) To uncover; to unveil.
   • 1797, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Osorio, London: John Pearson, 1873, Act I, p. 24,

     I pray you, think us friends—uncowl your face,

     For you seem faint, and the night-breeze blows healing.

   • 1850, John Savage “Love in the Golden Vale” in Lays of the Fatherland, New York: J.S. Redfield, p. 91,

     While we uncowl our souls,

     Bare to the God who rolls

     Earth on its icy poles,

     Clasp me in pray’r.

3. (instransitive) To remove or pull back one's cowl.
   • 1859, Louis Alexis Chamerovzow, The Chronicles of the Bastile, New York: Stanford & Delisser, Chapter 1, p. 26,

     “Monseigneur, it is not often your capuchin uncowls; least of all when he wishes to remain unknown! […] ”

   • 1905, Charles Whistler, A King’s Comrade, Chapter 16,

     And thence, after a word or two had passed, came the priest I had seen; and when he uncowled I knew him for my friend Selred, and glad I was to see him.

   • 1972, John Barth, Chimera, New York: Fawcett Crest, “Perseid,” p. 103,

     She wouldn’t uncowl, for modesty she said, but let me ground her and lift dun shift to white shoulders.

4. (transitive) To remove the cowl (protective covering) from (an engine).
   • 1980, George C. Larson, Fly on Instruments, Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Chapter 3, p. 29,

     […] uncowling the airplane before each flight is neither practical nor expected. In fact, uncowling such an airplane repeatedly may wear the latching or fastening devices.

   • 1994, Geza Szurovy and Mike Goulian, Basic Aerobatics, Blue Ridge Summit, PA: TAB Books, Chapter 20, p. 217,

     Uncowl the engine, check for evidence of any leaks.