crocodile [ME] The name of the crocodile comes from Greek krokodilos ‘worm of the stones’, from krokē ‘pebble’ and drilos ‘worm’. This is a reference to the crocodile’s habit of basking in the sun on the banks of a river. In medieval English the spellings cocodrille and cokadrill were common. If you accuse someone of shedding crocodile tears, you mean they are putting on a display of insincere sorrow. The expression dates from the mid 16th century and comes from the ancient belief that crocodiles wept while luring or devouring their prey. According to a 16th-century account of the sailor John Hawkins’s voyages, the crocodile’s nature ‘is ever when he would have his prey, to cry and sob like a Christian body, to provoke them to come to him, and then he snatcheth at them’.