n. A chair formerly used to punish offenders, in which a person was tied and exposed to public derision or ducked in water. [Middle English cukking stol, cukstol (a cucking stool probably being so called because a commode or seat enclosing a chamber pot was originally used for the purpose) : cukken, to defecate (of Old Norse origin; akin to Faroese kukka and Icelandic kúka) ; see kakka- in the Appendix of Indo-European roots + stol; see STOOL.] |
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