coigne of vantage

English

Noun

coigne of vantage (plural coignes of vantage)

1. Alternative form of coign of vantage
   • c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene vi]:

     No Iutty, frieze
     Buttrice, nor Coigne of vantage, but this Bird
     Hath made his pendant bed

   • 1884, Robert Kennaway Douglas, Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th ed., s.v. "Nanking":

     From the eaves of the several stories there hung one hundred and fifty-two bells, and countless lanterns adorned the same coignes of vantage.