A type of old plumbing or drainage fitting; a joint or connection piece used in pipework, especially in historical plumbing systems.
Origin obscure and possibly dialectal English; possibly from 'about' + 'cock' (a valve or fitting), though this etymology is uncertain and the word is largely obsolete.
This is a wonderfully obscure word that plumbers might have known centuries ago but which has almost vanished—it reminds us that every trade has vocabulary that disappears as technology changes, taking specialized knowledge with it.
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