Coastal Carolina’s mascot, explained: What is a chanticleer chicken?
Maybe no team has captured the coronary heart and imagination of university football enthusiasts in 2020 as a great deal as Coastal Carolina.
The Chanticleers, in just their fourth season as a Division I FBS team, have stormed to an eleven- document beneath 2nd-calendar year mentor Jamey Chadwell, successful the the Solar Belt co-division championship along with Louisiana (they have a thirty-27 head-to-head acquire in opposition to the Ragin’ Cajuns, but their championship video game rematch was canceled thanks to COVID-19 issues, leading to the Solar Belt to look at them co-champions).
As extraordinary as their season has been, having said that, the question remains:
What exactly is a Chanticleer?
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It truly is a question Coastal Carolina is prepared to solution. Without a doubt, the university’s official site has various articles or blog posts focused to that pretty question. Sporting Information is in this article to assistance solution that question as perfectly. With that, here is everything you will need to know about the Chanticleers, the nickname’s origins and history at Coastal and Carolina, and additional.
What is a chanticleer?
Just set, a chanticleer — pronounced SHON-ti-cleer — is a rooster. In that feeling, Coastal Carolina’s nickname just isn’t exclusive (though it is nonetheless uncommon). 3 other Division I football groups have equivalent nicknames: the South Carolina Gamecocks (FBS), the Jacksonville Condition Gamecocks (FCS) and the Delaware Fightin’ Blue Hens (FCS).
What sets Coastal Carolina’s Chanticleers nickname apart is its origin: It was impressed by Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales,” especially “The Nun’s Priest Tale.” Here’s how the chanticleer was described in stated story:
“His comb was redder than great coral and turreted like a castle wall, his invoice was black and shone like a jet, and his legs and toes were like azure. His nails were whiter than the lily and his feathers were like burnished gold.”
Maybe it can be a coincidence that Coastal Carolina’s official colors — teal and bronze — relatively resemble the actual physical description of Chaucer’s chanticleer. What just isn’t coincidental is how it arrived to be the official nickname of Coastal Carolina.
Why is Coastal Carolina’s nickname the Chanticleers?
The Chanticleers nickname was purposefully picked for the team in 1963, not only for the reason that of Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales,” but also for the reason that of Coastal Carolina’s connection with its dad or mum college.
Coastal, then a two-calendar year department campus of the College of South Carolina, selected its identify to mirror South Carolina’s Gamecock nickname. As one particular Coastal Carolina article places it, such a naming exercise “was an essential thing to consider in those people days.”
Prior to the identify change, Coastal Carolina’s nickname was the Trojans.
The person formally recognized for deciding on the Chanticleers is Cal F. Maddox, an English trainer for three yrs at Coastal Carolina, commencing in 1962. When the college — which didn’t have an athletics office at the time — developed a basketball team in 1963 to compete in a regional league, Maddox was chosen to mentor.
“I was no mentor, but when (Coastal Carolina chancellor) Dick Singleton questioned me to do it, I recognized,” Maddox stated.
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The English professor selected the Chanticleer nickname, as it met the criteria of similarity to South Carolina’s Gamecocks and alluded to the literary figure. For every a 2002 article from the Coastal Carolina College Journal, Fox also regarded it suitable thinking of his young team would will need to use their wits and teamwork to be prosperous, a great deal like the chanticleer from Chaucer’s tales.
For every the article, gamers on the team regarded other names, including the Seahawks and Sharks, just before settling on the Chanticleers. Fox regarded irrespective of whether to maintain an official poll for a new nickname soon after the stop of the to start with season, but Singleton reportedly suggested in opposition to it thanks to the significant media coverage of the curious nickname.
As a result, the Chanticleer identify caught, even when the college broke absent from South Carolina in 1993 to grow to be an unbiased public college.
What is Coastal Carolina’s mascot?
Coastal Carolina’s mascot is known as Chauncey — a crystal clear allusion to Chaucer.
The team also debuted a live mascot in 2011 with a rooster named Maddox, chosen by a pupil vote to honor the person who dubbed Coastal Carolina the Chanticleers.
