cootie

English

Etymology

Probably from Malay kutu (“flea, louse”) (and/or Tagalog/Māori). First attested in English in 1917 as British army slang during World War I.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈkuːti/

• Audio (Australia):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -uːti

Noun

cootie (plural cooties)

1. (dated, British Army military slang or Canada, US, colloquial) A louse (Pediculus humanus).
   • 1921, L. M. Montgomery, Rilla of Ingleside:

     "Tell Rilla I'm glad her war-baby is turning out so well, and tell Susan that I'm fighting a good fight against both Huns and cooties."
     "Mrs. Dr. dear," whispered Susan solemnly, "what are cooties?"
     Mrs. Blythe whispered back and then said in reply to Susan's horrified ejaculations, "It's always like that in the trenches, Susan."
     Susan shook her head and went away in grim silence to re-open a parcel she had sewed up for Jem and slip in a fine tooth comb.

3. (Canada, US, Australia, colloquial, childish, usually in the plural) Any germ or contaminant, real or imagined, especially from the opposite gender (for pre-pubescent children).

   I’m not drinking from his glass until I wash the cooties off it.

   • 2001, Michael Thompson, Ph.D., and Catherine O’Neill Grace with Lawrence J. Cohen, Ph.D., Best Friends, Worst Enemies: Understanding the Social Lives of Children:

     I asked them why they had separated themselves from one another so dramatically. One tiny girl, sitting up straight so she wouldn’t bump into the two large boys on either side of her, said matter-of-factly, “We found out that boys have cooties!”
     There was a chorus of assent from the other girls.
     ”Girls have cooties too!” the boys yelled, not to be outdone.

4. (rare) A nest-building female American coot (counterpart to cooter).
5. (rare, slang) A sideswiper, a type of telegraph key.

Hyponyms

• (germ or contaminant): boy germ, girl germ

Derived terms

• cootie catcher
• crazy as a cootie, crazy as a cootie bug

Translations

louse — see louse

childish: germ or contaminant

• Czech: breberky f pl
• Danish: drengelus (boys), pigelus (girls)
• Finnish: tyttöbakteeri (fi), tyttöpöpö (girl germ); poikabakteeri, poikapöpö (boy germ)
• Hungarian: baci (hu), fiúbaci (boy germ), lánybaci (girl germ)
• Japanese: 〇〇菌 (marumaru-kin, literally “[blank] germ”)
• Norwegian: guttelus (boys), jentelus (girls)
• Swedish: tjejbacill (sv) c, killbacill c

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

• French: ^{(please verify)} microbes (fr) m pl

See also

• lurgy

Scots

Etymology 1

Diminutive of cood possibly influenced by kittie (“a large washing-chamber”).

Noun

cootie (plural cooties)

1. (obsolete) A wooden dish or tub for kitchen use.

References

• “cood”, in The Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries, 2004–present, →OCLC.

Etymology 2

Possibly from coot (“ankle”).

Adjective

cootie

1. Having feathers on the legs.

   a cootie hen

   • 1876, Robert Burns, Tam Samson's Elegy:

     Ye cootie moorcocks

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

References

• “cootie”, in The Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries, 2004–present, →OCLC.