''capon'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260901232210-00-⌔

capon - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Noun

capon (plural capons)

• A cockerel which has been gelded and fattened for the table.
  • ✤ […] And then, the Iustice/In faire round belly, with good Capon lin’d,¹
  • ✤ […] You cannot feed capons so.²
  • ✤ “With vegetables in it, you know. Then turbot with thick sauce, then… roast beef; and mind it’s good. Yes, and capons, perhaps, and then sweets.”³

Verb

capon (third-person singular simple present capons, present participle caponing, simple past and past participle caponed)

• (transitive) To castrate; to make a capon of.

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English capoun, from Old English capūn, from Old Northern French capon (Old French chapon), from Latin cāpō, cāpōnem (Vulgar Latin ﹡cappō).

Pronunciation

• (General American, Received Pronunciation) IPA: /ˈkeɪpən/
• Audio (Southern England): 🔊

Printed 2026-09-01.

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Footnotes

1. c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene vii]: ↩

2. c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]: ↩

3. 1901 [1878], Constance Garnett, transl., Anna Karenina ‎${}^{[1]}$, translation of Анна Каренина (Anna Karenina) by Leo Tolstoy: ↩