quoit

English

WOTD – 18 February 2016

The equipment used for the game of deck-quoits. The quoits are the rings of rope.

An 1817 fashion plate depicting three women and a man playing an inverse ring toss, in which they are tossing a quoit

Etymology

From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Middle English coyte (“flat stone”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Old French coite, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Latin culcita. Doublet of quilt.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /kɔɪt/

  • Audio (UK):

    (file)

• IPA^(key): /kɔɪt/, /kwɔɪt/
• Rhymes: -ɔɪt

Noun

quoit (plural quoits)

1. A flat disc of metal or stone thrown at a target in the game of quoits.

   • 1922 , James Joyce, Ulysses, chapter IV:^[1]

     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.

2. A ring of rubber or rope similarly used in the game of deck-quoits.
3. The flat stone covering a cromlech.
4. The discus used in ancient sports.

Translations

flat disc thrown at a target

• Ido: disko (io)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Russian: метательное (metatelʹnoje) кольцо (kolʹco) (metátelʼnoje kolʼtsó)n

Verb

quoit (third-person singular simple present quoits, present participle quoiting, simple past and past participle quoited)

1. (intransitive) To play at quoits.
   • (Can we date this quote by Dryden and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)

     to quoit, to run, and steeds and chariots drive

2. (transitive) To throw as with a quoit.
   • (Can we date this quote?), William Cowper (translator), Homer's Iliad

     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.

Anagrams

• Quito, toqui