cockney

• n. 伦敦腔；伦敦人
• adj. 伦敦人的；伦敦方言的

cock, 公鸡。-ey, 蛋，词源同egg .字面意思即公鸡下的蛋，贬义用法，形容拿腔拿调的人。

cockney

cockney: [14] Etymologically, a cockney is a ‘cock’s egg’ (it comes from cokene, the old genitive plural of cock, and ey, the Middle English word for ‘egg’). This was a medieval term for a small or misshapen egg, the ‘runt’ of the clutch, supposedly laid by a cock, and it came to be applied (probably egged on by Middle English cocker ‘pamper’) to a ‘pampered child’ or ‘mother’s boy’.

In the 16th century we find that it has passed on to ‘town dweller’ (the notion being that people who lived in towns were soft and effete compared with countrymen), and by around 1600 it had started to mean more specifically ‘someone born in the city of London’. The popular definition ‘someone born within the sound of Bow bells’ is first reported by the lexicographer John Minsheu in 1617.
=> cock, egg

cockney (n.)

c. 1600, usually said to be from rare Middle English cokenei, cokeney "spoiled child, milksop" (late 14c.), originally cokene-ey "cock's egg" (mid-14c.). Most likely disentangling of the etymology is to start from Old English cocena "cock's egg" -- genitive plural of coc "cock" + æg "egg" -- medieval term for "runt of a clutch," extended derisively c. 1520s to "town dweller," gradually narrowing thereafter to residents of a particular neighborhood in the East End of London. Liberman, however, disagrees:

[I]n all likelihood, not the etymon of ME cokeney 'milksop, simpleton; effeminate man; Londoner,' which is rather a reshaping of [Old French] acoquiné 'spoiled' (participle). However, this derivation poses some phonetic problems that have not been resolved.

The accent so called from 1890, but the speech peculiarities were noted from 17c. As an adjective in this sense, from 1630s.

1. He had coarsened his voice to an approximation of Cockney.

他让自己的口音变得粗俗起来，接近伦敦东区的发音。

来自柯林斯例句

2. The Cockney accent was put on for effect.

这伦敦腔是为了给人以深刻印象而故意装出来的。

来自柯林斯例句

3. Pomeroy was a cockney barrow-boy at heart.

波默罗伊本质上就是个伦敦街头小贩。

来自柯林斯例句

4. The man spoke with a Cockney accent.

那人说话带伦敦东区口音。

来自柯林斯例句

5. Cockney is the colourful dialect spoken in the East End of London.

伦敦方言是在伦敦东区讲的颇有特色的地方语.

来自《现代汉英综合大词典》