cockle

«cockle» in Mova's school dictionary: A small edible shellfish with two ribbed, heart-shaped… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples.

part of speech

noun (a cockle, cockles)

meaning for a pupil

1) A small edible shellfish with two ribbed, heart-shaped shells, found in sand on beaches. tree →

2) (idiom) «It warms the cockles of my heart» means it makes me feel happy and loved. tree →

3) A small light boat (also called a cockleshell). tree →

sense in the lessons

In science and seaside lessons cockles are molluscs that live buried in wet sand. The Irish song «Molly Malone» has «cockles and mussels, alive, alive-o». The heartwarming idiom is used in everyday British, Irish and Australian talk.

examples

• We found empty cockle shells on the beach. tree →
• Cockles bury themselves in wet sand. tree →
• Molly Malone sold cockles and mussels in Dublin. tree →
• Your kind letter warmed the cockles of my heart. tree →
• People in Wales still gather cockles at low tide. tree →
• The tiny cockle bobbed on the waves. tree →

note

Countable: one cockle, two cockles. The idiom always uses the plural: «the cockles of your heart». A cockle is a mollusc, an animal without a backbone, like mussels and clams.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «cockle» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.