pining stool

English

Noun

pining stool (plural pining stools)

  1. (now rare, historical) A cucking stool.
    • c. 1385, William Langland, Piers Plowman, section III:
      To punyschen on pillories · and pynynge stoles / Brewesteres and bakesteres · bocheres and cokes.
    • 2004, Gordon Campbell, Renaissance Art and Architecture, page 55:
      The cucking stool or pining stool (known from the eighteenth century as the ducking stool) was used to duck scolds and disorderly women into ponds and rivers […].
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