What's A Cockie/Cocky?

Subject: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From:
Date: 12 Jan 99 - 06:26 PM

No, this isn't another thread to shock the delicate.

In the song (Aussie, I would think) The Lime Juice Tub I seem to hear a reference to a "cockie". What is that or who are they?

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: alison
Date: 12 Jan 99 - 06:54 PM

Hi,

Tim we've had this before probably in relation to "Now I'm easy". I'm just off to see if I can find the link.

Slainte

alison

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: alison
Date: 12 Jan 99 - 07:13 PM

Hi again,

I admit defeat I can't find it....... but in case it jogs someone elses memory there was a thread where someone wanted to know what an "old black gin" was........ it's from the same song.... "Now I'm easy".

It lead on to a few Aussies giving their tuppence worth...

good luck

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: The Shambles
Date: 12 Jan 99 - 07:14 PM

To tell the sex of a parrot,
Is a difficult think to do.
You may find your Pretty Polly,
Is really a Cockatoo.

Is that, not, what it is?

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Dale Rose
Date: 12 Jan 99 - 07:29 PM

This is the second time I have tried to send this. I hope the first one does not show up.

A Prairie Home Companion has a real audio clip of a song done by a group calledMountain Aire which uses the term. I wondered what it was too, after hearing the song last year. Sounds like it might be Australian in origin.

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: alison
Date: 12 Jan 99 - 07:41 PM

It is Australian. He's some sort of a farmer..... the othere's will be able to fill you in better.

Slainte

alison

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: alison
Date: 12 Jan 99 - 07:55 PM

Well in the immortal words of Mo.... YYYYEEEEEESSSSSSS.

I found it, it was hiding in a thread about getting older. (Drives me nuts when I know they're there and can't find them...)

Go down to Alan of Australia's entry for 8/10/97 @ 04:51

Songs about getting really old

Slainte

alison

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From:
Date: 13 Jan 99 - 02:12 AM

As far as I can see "cocky" means anyone who lives in the country rather than the big city. They come into Sydney during the school holidays and a favorite sport among some of my friends is cocky spotting. I don't find anything that easy a sport.

Murray

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Alan of Australia
Date: 13 Jan 99 - 04:08 AM

G'day,
Pasted from the MacQuarie Dictionary (very comprehensive Aussie dictionary) CD ROM:

cocky [2]
Colloq.
-n.
1. a cockatoo, or other parrot.
2. a farmer, esp. one who farms in a small way.
3. a mouth like a cocky's cage, a mouth which is unpleasantly furred, as a result of sickness, excess drinking, etc.
-v.i.
4. to follow the occupation of a farmer.

And that's official!

Cheers,
Alan

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From:
Date: 13 Jan 99 - 05:24 PM

Cocky's Cage? Sounds like a good name for a band.

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Bob BoltonBob Bolton
Date: 13 Jan 99 - 06:40 PM

G'day Tim (et Al...ison),

The term "cockie" or cockatoo farmer (as in the song The Stringybark Cockatoo" goes back to John Robertson's Land Selection Act (NSW ~ 1865) when the big land holdings of "Squatters" (major property owners leasing land from the government) were made accessible to small-holders who could BUY the land from the government on terms, as long as they complied with rules requiring them to clear and farm specified proportions of the land every year.

The Squatters were unimpressed by the loss of their government sponsored monopoly and disparagingly called the small-holders "cockatoo farmers" - possibly because they said they swarmed over "their" land like a flock of cockatoos stripping a crop or (and this is probably later) because all they could raise on a few hundred acres was cockatoos!

The term 'squatter' went on to mean any large-holding pastoralist, whether leasing or owning, and usually means a grazier, rather than a farmer. The country areas have been said to be ruled by The "Squattocracy". Even they could fall on hard times, as detailed in Charles Flower's poignant song from the 1890s depression "The Broken-down Squatter".

Leasehold has continued to be a cheap way to control vast areas, as seen recently when Native Title claims have been directed towards leaseholdings ... and sent pastoralists, clutching their chequebooks and demanding a transfer to freehold.

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Bill DBill D
Date: 13 Jan 99 - 08:33 PM

ok...that clears up a lot! Now, one more....when I sing "The Eumarella Shore", I envision the 'hero' of the song, a 'free-selector', as being someone living on the edges of the squatters land, (it being too large to easily be patrolled), and helping himself to the odd livestock that wander away from the herds. Is/was this anywhere near the truth? In other words, is there a difference between freeholders who bought land legally, and free-selectors who may simply be living there because it is too much trouble to chase them away? (In the U.S 'Old West' there were rustlers who simply made a living stealing stock that could not be easily watched...)

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Bob BoltonBob Bolton
Date: 14 Jan 99 - 01:34 AM

G'day Bill D,

(who, presumably, is no more called Bill DBill D than I am Bob BoltonBob Bolton!).

The person who 'selected' land under the Land Selection act was often called a 'Free-selector' even though he eventually had to pay for the land, as well as comply with the Government clearing objectives that have stripped away 90% of the trees that were holding down the last of the thinnest soil on earth!

When I talk of 'freehold' above I mean the modern state of owning the land totally under the (now) old freehold title - as opposed to the lesser certainties of 'Torrens Title' ... the modern replacement that lets governments and authorities take it back under some conditions (which they write).

"The Eumarella Shore" is a song dating back to the beginnings of free-selection and is written from the 'squatters' point of view. ... OK, it is true that a lot of the new free-selectors did a bit of free-lance 'duffing' (the Australian equivalent of rustling) - particularly of 'cleanskin' calves wandering unfenced squatters' runs. The free-selectors were obliged to fence their land and didn't lose track of any of their own small herd on a smaller run.

Of course, before free-selection, these same squatters had been energetically pinching each other's cattle ... but that was different ... they were the same class, and it all balanced out in the end ... but these damned cocky farmers ....!

There were, of course, in the earlier days many duffers who simply herded cattle into quiet, unmapped valleys and rounded them up to sell miles away, but that is why governments employ surveyors ... and troopers. After the Gold rush of the 1850s brought thousands of gold-seekers into the inland ... and hundreds of government officials to milk as much as possible in the way of license fees ... the areas were better known.

Very few large-scale duffings occurred in the latter parts of the 19th century, anywhere but at the further edges of the outback. Howvever, it is said the only time a grazier ever ate his own beef was when he dined with his neighbour's!

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Pete M
Date: 14 Jan 99 - 05:40 PM

The term is also used in NZ, having been imported from Oz in the last century. On its own it denotes a sheep farmer, cattle farmers being "Cow cockies".

Pete M

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 14 Jan 99 - 07:01 PM

While we're at it, can someone say somthing authoritative about "Pommy" (or Pommie), other than it's the first part of Pommy Bahstad?

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Benjamin Bodhránaí
Date: 14 Jan 99 - 08:42 PM

Boy that's a can of worms!!!! There always seems to be a great deal of discussion about the word POM and it's derivation. Here's three that I have heard:

P.O.M.: Prisoner of Mother England - New convicts to Australia.

Short for Pomegranate (rhymes with immigrant) - fairly unlikely I think but also the first version I ever heard about 20 years ago.

Short for pomegranate - something to do with the colour of the pomegranate's flesh (white) being like that of a new chum, or the skin being like that of said new chum after a while in Oz.

I think that the first is generally accepted, but the dictionary I just looked at says uncertain origin. Here in South Australia we just got it as an import from the Eastern States at first, we had no convicts, so what would we really know.

Also in regards cocky farmer's, in South Oz we have a cocky gate (don't know about the rest of Oz) which is similar to something in NZ called a taranaki gate. Very cheap way of leaving a gap in the fence by just using a fence section, spacers and all, as a gate and straining an end spacer to a fixed fence post. Cocky farmers used them because they were cheap and easy. They don't stand up to charging cattle to well though.

Benjamin

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Bill D
Date: 15 Jan 99 - 12:22 AM

I really want to thank Bob Bolton(the singular) and Benjamin for the info!..it clears up a lot of concepts that have been fuzzy for years!!

sadly, the part that hurts me, is

"the Government clearing objectives that have stripped away 90% of the trees that were holding down the last of the thinnest soil on earth! "

I am a woodturner/collector, and those wonderful Australian trees are some of the most eagerly sought in the woodcollectors society...(we NEVER cut rare trees just to get a sample..always use fallen or legally cut timbers)...to think the govt. encouraged stripping them!! Arrggh!! (I think that the prettiest wood I ever saw was a piece of desert Gidgee!)

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 17 Jan 99 - 05:16 PM

G'day all:

Benjamin Bodhra/nai/: Unlikely as it may seem, the best support is for the "pomegranate" derivation. I remeber reading a fairly scholarly study that showed phrases like "immy-grant, jimmy-grany, pommy-grant" were recoded as children's chants before any other (Folk?) derivations.

The additional reason for the epithet was that newly arrived "Poms" quickly acquired red complexions (or sunburn?) like the skins of pomegranates.

Bill D: It saddens me too! the colonial government saw forest as waste land to be quickly converted into good English style farmlands. The only place where this was broadly feasible was Tasmania, which had the benefit of a recent ice age to renew the soil. Mainland Australia has had no grinding glaciers in the last few ice ages and the remaining soil is very thin.

My father was a tradesman woodturner and I know a number of art woodturners. I also have a very good friend, Neil Bollingmoore, who is a woodturner by trade - recently working on the west coast of Tasmania doing fancy gew-gaws for the tourist trade.

Some time back there was a thread about The Woodturner's Love Song" written by Sydney songwriter Phyl Lobl after talking to Neil. Inspired by his obvious love for the different woods, she created a song in which the tongue-tied turner woos with wooden gifts. This is a song very close to my heart, as it so closely resembles my own father.

I have been recently experimenting with making wooden playing 'bones' from a wide range of Australian woods ... from Huon Pine (which is all old - you are not allowed to even trim pieces from standing trees) to ironbarks and other inland eucalypts that are fairly close to twice the density of oak ... often heavier and far harder than lignum vitae (from which I made a series of 'bones' some years back).

One reference in an interview with a 'bones' player suggested Gidgee or Jittah as the best for the purpose. I have not yet been able to get a sample, so I can't comment. Some of these desert Acacias are over 1300 ADD (specific density = 1.3 [dry!]) and the native Australians valued them for spearwood (I think that gidgee means spear in one of the Queensland languages).

I suspect that they would ring rather than click. I did make a pair some years back with Australian Purpleheart, another desert Acacia, and they had an incredible sound but it followed the incredible shockwave they transmitted to the fingers ... not the instrument for a long session!

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: GUEST,o'malley
Date: 02 Aug 18 - 03:16 PM

Actually, I was a member of a band called "Cocky" way back in the late 70s..we played a night at CBGBs...Broadway Charlie's. ..Mothers....pretty good group...

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Gurney
Date: 02 Aug 18 - 11:29 PM

When I asked for the origin of the term Pom,(I was described as one) I was told it was short for Pomeranian, a small dog that yapped a lot.

The truth is lost in antiquity.

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Aug 18 - 03:20 AM

I thought this might be of interest so I've scanned it in full
It's the Australian slang section of 'The Insect That Stole Butter' (The Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins) - a wonderfully entertaining and informing book
Jim Carroll

AUSTRALASIAN English has been enriched by the hundreds of indigenous languages that pre dated European settlers, although only about 50 continue as first languages today. The 18th-century journals of the explorer Captain James Cook (1728-79) record kangaroo as the animal name used by Aboriginals in what is now North Queensland. The later suggestion that the word actually meant 'I don’t understand’, given as a reply to an enquiry in English, took people’s fancy but seems to be an invented story. In Australia one way of suggesting that someone is mad or eccentric is to say that they have kangaroos in the top paddock—a zoological contrast with the traditional British 'bats in the belfry'.
When European settlers first came across the Aboriginal word budgerigar for the colourful little native bird they had no idea how they should spell it, and early attempts included betshiregah, budgery garr, and budgregore. The Maori word kiwi was first used in English in the 1830s. People started using the bird as the emblem of New Zealand at the end of the 1890s, and New Zealanders have been known as Kiwis since shortly after that.
The larrikin is one of the Australian stereotypes—the maverick with an apparent disregard for convention or the boisterous young man. The word could have been brought over from England—it is recorded in Cornish dialect in the 1880s—or based on Larry, a form of the man’s name Lawrence common in Ireland and the Irish-Australian community.
During the First World War, Australian and New Zealand soldiers were referred to as diggers, in the sense 'miner', which was used for gold and opal miners in Australasia. In peacetime, digger became a friendly form of address for a man, like cobber, which probably came from English dialect cob ‘to like'. One of the things that friends do together is drink, and as a consequence may chunder, or vomit, in the dunny. The first is probably from rhyming slang Chunder Loo = ‘spew’. Chunder Loo of Akim Foo was a cartoon character devised by Norman Lindsay (1879-1969) that appeared in advertisements for Cobra boot polish in the early 20th century. Dunny, or toilet', was originally a dunnekin, an English dialect word from dung and ken, meaning 'house'.
Australians may refer to a Brit as a Limey or a pom. The former comes from the rations of lime juice given to Royal Navy seamen to ward off scurvy, while the latter term probably derives from ‘POMEGRANATE, as a near rhyme for ‘immigrant’. The red, sunburnt cheeks of new arrivals may also
have reminded people of the fruit. If an Australian or New Zealander tells you to rattle your dags, you would be well advised to hurry up. Dags are locks of wool clotted with dung at the rear end of a sheep, which can rattle as they move. The word may be related to tag, and goes back to medieval England, when dags were pointed divisions on the edge of a garment that were then fashionable. Today an entertaining or eccentric person can also be called a dag, as can someone who is untidy or dirty-looking, or an awkward adolescent.
Australian bushmen used various women’s names for a bundle or ‘swag’ of personal belongings, but Matilda is the one whose name stuck, especially after 1893 when A. B. 'Banjo' Paterson (1864-1941) wrote his famous song 'Waltzing Matilda'. To waltz (or walk) Matilda is to travel the roads carrying your swag. The other woman’s name forever associated with Australia is Sheila, an Irish name that has meant 'a girl or woman’ since the 1820s.
The billy or billycan used in the Australian bush was until recently thought to derive from an Aboriginal word for ‘water’, billa, which is also found in billabong, a branch of a river forming a backwater. In fact, it is probably from the old Scots word billy-pot ‘cooking utensil'.
One of Australia’s best-loved exports in recent years has been the singer Kylie Minogue. Many of her fans will be unaware that in Western Australia a kylie is a boomerang. The word is from the Aboriginal language Nyungar.
See also ANTIPODES, BLUE, BUNG, DINKUM, FURPHY, LAIRY, MOCKER, PIKE, POSSUM, SKITE, TUCKER

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: GUEST,Bob Coltman
Date: 03 Aug 18 - 07:31 AM

Cockies are defined as small farmers in comments relating to the Australian song "Cockies of Bungaree." The following at https://mainlynorfolk.info/lloyd/songs/cockiesofbungaree.html refers specifically to A.L. Lloyd's rendition of the song:

"Cockies are small farmers. Bungaree is sixteen kilometres east of Ballarat in Victoria."

"There is some pretty poor country around Bungaree. Perhaps that was what made the cockies such skinflints thereabouts. They tell of one cocky so mean before he put the milk on the hand's table, he used to skim it on top; then when no one was looking, he'd turn it over and skin it on the bottom as well. Perhaps it was the same fellow who was so tight, he laid off the hands of his watch. The great Bungaree song began life as the doleful complaint of a potato lifter."

Come all you weary travellers that's out of work just mind,
You take a trip to Bungaree and plenty there you'll find.
Have a trial with the cockies, you can take it straight from me,
I'm very sure you'll rue the day you first saw Bungaree. ...

[Full lyrics at ref'd site]

Bob

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: GUEST,Bogle Cocky
Date: 03 Aug 18 - 09:36 AM

Cockies are small freeholders?
Eric Bogle song
For nearly sixty years, I've been a Cockie
Of droughts and fires and floods I've lived through plenty
This country's dust and mud have seen my tears and blood
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

I married a fine girl when I was twenty
But she died in giving birth when she was thirty
No flying doctor then, just a gentle old black 'gin
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

She left me with two sons and a daughter
On a bone-dry farm whose soil cried out for water
So my care was rough and ready, but they grew up fine and steady
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

My daughter married young, and went her own way
My sons lie buried by the Burma Railway
So on this land I've made me home, I've carried on alone
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

City folks these days despise the Cockie
Say with subsidies and dole, we've had it easy
But there's no drought or starving stock on a sewered suburban block
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

For nearly sixty years, I've been a Cockie
Of droughts and fires and floods, I've lived through plenty
This country's dust and mud, have seen my tears and blood
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy
And now I'm easy

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Aug 18 - 11:11 AM

This makes sense to me
Jim Carroll

"Cockatoo Farmer"
Etymology
Probably refers to the practice of working a small patch of land for a short period before moving on, in the manner of a feeding cockatoo.[1] Alternatively so called to compare the farmers with the common sulphur-crested cockatoo, which come down on the newly sown cornfields in myriads.
Noun
cockatoo farmer (plural cockatoo farmers)
(Australia, derogatory, obsolete) A small-scale farmer.
Usage notes
The term was used by squatters in disparagement of the small scale of the operations.
References
^ Australian National Dictionary Centre » Meanings and origins of Australian words and idioms » C.
Lentzner Karl, "Dictionary of the slang-english of Australia, and of some mixed languages", 1893.

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Raedwulf
Date: 03 Aug 18 - 12:53 PM

The one thing I can contribute is that any acronymnic derivation for Pom is rubbish. If a word has attribution from before WWI (which it does), any acronymic derivation is rubbish. It was only with WWI that they really started to be used (Toc-H, Ack-Ack, and suchlike derive from the then phonetic alphabet). You can debate about the why of pomegranate (the version I heard was that transportees were fed pome's to help ward off scurvy on the voyage), but pomegranate it is, not "Prisoner of..."

It's not "For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge", it's low German; it's not Ship High In Transit, it's A/S scitte (sc was pronounced sh) - common & garden (& messy & unpleasant) diarrhoea!

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: JennieG
Date: 03 Aug 18 - 05:29 PM

I found out that "pompey" is a term for someone from Portsmouth, England......and many British ships called at Portsmouth on their way to Australia; for a very long time the only way to get to Australia from anywhere else in the world was by sea. It's not too far a stretch to turn "pompey" into "pommy", then into "pom".

That's my theory, anyway.

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Raedwulf
Date: 03 Aug 18 - 07:15 PM

Alas, Jennie, you are guilty of cod etymology (see what I did there? ;-) ). Wiki's concise explanation runs thus, "The city's nickname Pompey is thought to have derived from the log entry of Portsmouth Point, contracted to "Po'm.P." as ships entered the harbour. Navigational charts use the contraction."

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: JennieG
Date: 03 Aug 18 - 07:25 PM

You may be, Raedwulf, but not I.....I didn't look at that Wiki entry. I gained my knowledge from a book (the title, alas, has disappeared into the mists of time) in which sailors from Portsmouth were referred to as "Pompeys".

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Raedwulf
Date: 04 Aug 18 - 11:20 AM

In which case you gained your false etymology from a false source, I'm afraid, Jennie. Pompey is certainly a nickname for the city, the football club, and presumably for the inhabitants and / or sailors, but your etymology is nonsense, sorry. I'm not a professional by any means, but I am a very keenly interested amateur. From the linguistic p-o-v, it's inconceivable that the second p in pompey would simply be dropped in the timescale. A p sound might evolve to or from a b, but it doesn't simply disappear or turn into an m in a hundred years.

The origin is not certain either of pommie or pompey; there are several theories for each; but the earliest recorded use of the former dates to around the end of the 19thC; for the latter, there are a couple of theories that would place its first use around the end of the 18thC (I can't find a firm date, even decade-wise, as to its first use). There is absolutely nothing that suggests any link between the two. I could go on about penal transportation, for example, but you probably already think I'm rather snottily trying to lecture you (which impression I'm trying to avoid giving, probably unsuccessfully!).

Go and have a hunt for yourself. If you can find anything at all that indicates a link 'twixt pompey & pommie, I would certainly be interested in seeing it. I cannot find anything myself...

(This covers all of the major theories as to the origin of Pompey - I'm inclined to discount the 'pompier' theory on the grounds that there's no reason why it should have become peculiarly attached to Portsmouth only.)

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: The Sandman
Date: 04 Aug 18 - 01:03 PM

RAEDWULF please stop, this thread is about What's A Cockie/Cocky

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Raedwulf
Date: 04 Aug 18 - 01:17 PM

Sandman - bugger off. Mudcat threads meander, generally speaking to the general entertainment / education. I'm talking quite happily with Jennie (I don't know if she's talking quite happily with me; I'm sure she'll be back to say! ;-) ). You, on the other hand, are adding nothing. This a 20 year old thread that has been randomly resurrected. One of the joys of Mudcat! :) What useful point do you think you are making?

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: The Sandman
Date: 04 Aug 18 - 02:52 PM

I have added relevant info about cockies ,i suggest you bugger off with your pedantic sad irrelevant twadlle

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: JennieG
Date: 05 Aug 18 - 02:08 AM

According to "A dictionary of Australian colloquialisms" by G.A. Wilkes (a copy of which is in my hand as we speak) the term "cocky" was first used in print by Rolf Boldrewood in 1877: 'If it wasn't for these confounded cockies' said Mr Windsor 'that big flat would be a first-rate place to break 'em into'.

'Cocky's joy' is golden syrup, so named because a scraping of said sweet treat on a slice of damper (home made bread cooked over a fire) was probably the happiest thing in the daily life of a cocky farmer. People of my generation and older always refer to golden syrup as 'cocky's joy'.

Subject: RE: What's A Cockie/Cocky?
From: Raedwulf
Date: 05 Aug 18 - 04:13 AM

I suggest, Sandman, you actually bother to read the thread. I didn't introduce the discussion about 'pom', I only contributed to it. As for I have added relevant info about cockies, really? Cos I only see two entries under your handle, both of which are whining at me! So you know what you can do. Mudcat threads often meander. Someone brought up 'pom'. Get over it.