Cowardly, timid, or lacking courage; easily frightened or unwilling to take risks.
Compound adjective combining 'chicken' (a bird often portrayed as timid) and 'hearted' (having a certain quality of heart/courage). The phrase developed from the metaphor of chickens as creatures that readily flee from danger, with roots in medieval animal symbolism.
Ironically, real chickens are far braver than this slur suggests—they'll fiercely protect their chicks and fight predators to the death—but the reputation stuck because in medieval times, chickens were simply more visible and vulnerable farm animals than the truly skittish birds people lived among.
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