"coony" adj. = sly, cunning, 1910

[Joel S. Berson]

At 2/3/2010 08:55 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>HDAS has _coony_, "sly," from 1899.

So do we think, as George Thompson hints but does not come right out
and assert, that "coony" = 'sly' comes from the sly raccoon?

Joel


>JL
>
>
>On Wed, Feb 3, 2010 at 8:21 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > Subject:      Re: "coony" adj. = sly, cunning, 1910
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Alison, apology accepted.  But as to bald like a raccoon, I have that
> > on the best authority -- the OED's definition of "coony a.", under
> > "coon, n."  ... Oops, perhaps they're wrong -- they've spelt it "racoon"!
> >  :-)
> >
> > Joel
> >
> > At 2/3/2010 07:02 PM, Alison Murie wrote:
> > >>~~~~~~~~~~~~
> > >>' "bald" like a raccoon??'  Coons ain't bald.  Far from it.  'Possums
> > >>look bald, but aren't.   Perhaps the meaning of "coony" is really
> > >>cunning, which would be more appropriate altogether.
> > >>AM
> > >~~~~~~~~~~
> > >Ooops.  Somehow I missed para 2 in Joel's post.  I'm sorting through a
> > >mountain of backlogged mail.  I was away from my desk for ten days
> > >getting a bad hip replaced & being whipped into a semblance of normal
> > >functioning by a crew of therapists.  Medicare is wonderful.  (Only it
> > >didn't get me to read my mail more carefully.)
> > >AM
> >
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