c. 1605, William Shakespeare, King Lear, Act II, Scene 4,
He rais’d the house with loud and coward cries.

Invading Fears repel my Coward Joy;
And Ills foreseen the pleasant Bliss destroy.

Cowards dye many times before their deaths, / The valiant neuer taſte of death but once: […]

1856: Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary, Part II Chapter IV, translated by Eleanor Marx-Aveling
He tortured himself to find out how he could make his declaration to her, and always halting between the fear of displeasing her and the shame of being such a coward, he wept with discouragement and desire. Then he took energetic resolutions, wrote letters that he tore up, put it off to times that he again deferred.

The first he coped with was their captain, whom / His sword sent headless to seek out a tomb. / This cowarded the valour of the rest, […]

Coward

Meaning

Noun

Adj

Verb

Name

Origin