husband

⇒ Chinese: 黑漆板凳 (hēiqī bǎndèng) (obsolete)

→ Japanese: ハズバンド (hazubando)

⇒ English: husbando

From Middle English husbonde, housbonde, from Old English hūsbonda, hūsbunda (“male head of a household, householder, master of a house”), from Old Norse húsbóndi (“master of house”), from hús (“house”) + bóndi (“dweller, householder”), equivalent to house + bond (“serf, slave", originally, "dweller”).
Bond in turn represents a formation derived from the present participle of West Scandinavian búa, East Scandinavian bôa = to build, plow; compare German bauen, der Bauende. Cognate with Icelandic húsbóndi (“head of household”), Faroese húsbóndi (“husband”), Norwegian husbond (“head of household, husband”), Swedish husbonde (“master”), Danish husbond (“husband”) (< Old Danish husbonde).

cog

You should start dating so you can find a suitable husband.

The husband and wife are one person in law.

1765–1769, William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, (please specify |book=I to IV), Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] Clarendon Press, →OCLC:

A great bargain also had been[…]the arm-chair in which Bunting now sat forward, staring into the dull, small fire. In fact, that arm-chair had been an extravagance of Mrs. Bunting. She had wanted her husband to be comfortable after the day's work was done, and she had paid thirty-seven shillings for the chair.

1913, Mrs. [Marie] Belloc Lowndes, chapter I, in The Lodger, London: Methuen, →OCLC; republished in Novels of Mystery: The Lodger; The Story of Ivy; What Really Happened, New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green and Co., […], [1933], →OCLC, page 0016:

But Sophia's mother was not the woman to brook defiance. After a few moments' vain remonstrance her husband complied. His manner and appearance were suggestive of a satiated sea-lion.

1921, Ben Travers, chapter 6, in A Cuckoo in the Nest, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, published 1925, →OCLC:

A man in a marriage or marital relationship, especially in relation to his spouse.

(UK) A manager of property; one who has the care of another's belongings, owndom, or interests; a steward; an economist.

While reading her book, Sally leaned back against her husband, wishing it were the human kind.

A large cushion with arms meant to support a person in the sitting position; a husband pillow.


husband

en-verb

husband (third-person singular simple present husbands, present participle husbanding, simple past and past participle husbanded)

husbands (present singular third-person)
husbanding (participle present)
husbanded (participle past)
husbanded (past)

(transitive) To engage or act as a husband to; assume the care of or responsibility for; accept as one's own.


wife

wife (third-person singular simple present wifes, present participle wifing, simple past and past participle wifed)

wifes (present singular third-person)
wifing (participle present)
wifed (participle past)
wifed (past)

Etymology tree
Proto-Germanic *wībą
Proto-West Germanic *wīb
Old English wīf
Middle English wyf
English wife
Inherited from Middle English wyf, wif, from Old English wīf (“woman, wife”), from Proto-West Germanic *wīb, from Proto-Germanic *wībą (“woman, wife”).
Germanic cognates include Scots wife (“wife”), West Frisian wiif (“wife, woman”), Saterland Frisian Wieuw (“woman, lady, female”), North Frisian wüf (“wife, woman”), Dutch wijf (“woman, female”), Low German Wief (“woman, female”), German Weib (“woman, wife, female”), Danish viv (“wife, woman”), Norwegian viv (“wife, woman, girl”), Swedish viv (“woman”), Faroese vív (“wife, woman”), Icelandic víf (“woman”).
The further etymology is unknown, with a number of disputed suggestions. One suggestion connects Tocharian A/B kip/kwīpe (“genitals, female pudenda”), for a hypothetical Indo-European *gʰwíbʰ- (“pudenda”).
Another suggestion connects Old English wǣfan (“wrap, clothe”), Old Norse vífa (“wrap, veil”) for a suggested original motive of "married woman wearing a scarf".
Yet another suggestion connects Old High German weibōn (“move to and fro”), Old Norse veifa (“swing, throw”), for a motive of "one who is moving busily; housekeeper, maidservant" (cf. German Weibel (“manservant, usher”)).

cog

Mentally scarred for life, love is war / And some chicks are just too hard to wife

2004, “Guinnesses”, in Mm..Food, performed by MF Doom ft. Angelika & 4-IZE:

Mecca knew she wasn't lying. She had the type of beauty that made niggas want to wife her.

2009, Ashley Antoinette Coleman, JaQuavis Coleman, The Cartel, volume 1, →ISBN, page 106:

I thought that I was going to wife her, but because of the new news with my brother I couldn't do it.

2010, Kenya K. Watkins, The Life You Choose, →ISBN, page 154:

But I told you that you're not a wifeable woman, and I told him so, and he wanted to wife you anyway.

(slang, African-American Vernacular) To marry (a woman).


polygamy

en-noun

polygamy (countable and uncountable, plural polygamies)

Recorded since 1591, from Late Latin polygamia, from Ancient Greek πολυγαμία (polugamía), itself from πολύγαμος (polúgamos, “married to many”), from πολύς (polús, “many”) + γάμος (gámos, “marriage”). Relates to modern prefix and suffix poly- + -gamy.

تَعَدُّدُ الأَزْوَاج

the having of a plurality of socially bonded sexual partners at the same time

usually understood as “polygyny”, but may include “polyandry”, unlike تَعَدُّدُ الزَّوْجَات (taʕaddudu z-zawjāt)

Are there countries where polygamy is legal for both men and women?

Miss Griffin was a model of propriety, and I am at a loss to imagine what the feelings of the virtuous woman would have been, if she had known, when she paraded us down the Hampstead Road two and two, that she was walking with a stately step at the head of Polygamy and Mahomedanism.

1859, Charles Dickens, The Haunted House:

The condition of having more than one spouse or marriage partner at one time.


polygyny

polygyny (countable and uncountable, plural polygynies)

From Ancient Greek πολύ (polú, “many”) + γυνή (gunḗ, “woman, wife”). By surface analysis, poly- + -gyny.

The condition of an ant colony that has multiple egg-laying queens.


endogamy

endogamy (usually uncountable, plural endogamies)

Far from suggesting a demoralized culture, endogamy here seemed the mark of a buoyantly confident group, settled in their skin and not needing outsiders.

1995, Isabel Fonseca, Bury Me Standing, Vintage, published 2007, page 24:

The practice of marrying or requiring to marry within one's own ethnic, religious, or social group.

endogàmia

the practice of marrying within one's own social group


union

union (countable and uncountable, plural unions)

→ Bengali: ইউনিয়ন (iuniẏon) (learned)

From Middle English unyoun, from Old French union, from Late Latin ūniō, ūniōnem (“oneness, unity”), from Latin ūnus (“one”). Doublet of unio.

der

(countable) The state of being united or joined; a state of unity or harmony.

unie

the act of uniting or the state of being united

sameining

the act or process of uniting; more rarely, the state of being united


bridegroom

/ˈbɹaɪdˌɡɹuːm/

From Middle English brydgrome, bridegome, from Old English brȳdguma, from Proto-Germanic *brūdigumô; equivalent to Old English brȳd (“bride”) + guma (“man”). Altered by folk etymology to end with groom, with it re-analyzed as or influenced by grom, grome (“attendant”), as guma was obsolete. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Brüüdicham, Dutch bruidegom, Afrikaans bruidegom, German Low German Brödigam, Brüdigam, Brögam, Brügam, Plautdietsch Briegaum, German Bräutigam, Norwegian Bokmål brudgom, Norwegian Nynorsk brudgom, Danish brudgom, Swedish brudgum, Icelandic brúðgumi, Faroese brúðgómur.

A man in the context of his own wedding; one who is going to marry or has just been married.

Briegaum (cf. German Low German: Brügam m)

ženih

Slovene has a very large number of regional synonyms


marriage

en-noun

marriage (countable and uncountable, plural marriages)

From Middle English mariage, from Old French mariage, from marier (“to marry”), from Latin marītō (“marry”, verb, literally “give in marriage”), from marītus (“lover”, “nuptial”), from mas (“male, masculine, of the male sex”). Equivalent to marry + -age. Doublet of maritage. Displaced native Old English sinsċipe.

der

marriage by cohabitation with habit and repute

You should enter marriage for love.


groom

From Middle English grom, grome (“man-child, boy, youth”), of uncertain origin. Apparently related to Middle Dutch grom (“boy”), Old Icelandic grómr, gromr (“man, manservant, boy”), Old French gromme (“manservant”), and also to Middle Dutch grom (“fish guts”), Middle Low German grôm (“fish guts”), from the same Proto-Germanic root. Possibly from Old English *grōma, from Proto-West Germanic *grōmō, *grōm (“swollen belly, stomach tumour, womb-child, fish roe, fish guts”), from Proto-Germanic *grōaną (“to grow”).
Alternative etymology describes Middle English grom, grome as an alteration of gome (“man”) with an intrusive r (also found in bridegroom, hoarse, cartridge, etc.), with the Middle Dutch and Old Icelandic cognates following similar variation of their respective forms.

Toward the end of the war, Benoit was sent off on his own with forged papers; he wound up working as a horse groom at a chalet in the Loire valley. Mandelbrot describes this harrowing youth with great sangfroid.

2013 January, Brian Hayes, “Father of Fractals”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 1, page 62:


bride

From Middle English bride, from Old English brȳd (“bride”), from Proto-West Germanic *brūdi, from Proto-Germanic *brūdiz (“bride”).
Cognate with Saterland Frisian Bräid (“bride”), West Frisian breid (“bride”), German Low German Bruut (“bride”), Dutch bruid (“bride”), German Braut (“bride”), Danish brud (“bride”), Swedish brud (“bride”).

I will show thee the bride, the Lamb's wife.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Revelation 21:9:

Has by his own experience tried
 How much the wife is dearer than the bride.

1746, George Lyttelton, An Irregular Ode:

Sophia broke down here. Even at this moment she was subconsciously comparing her rendering of the part of the forlorn bride with Miss Marie Lohr's.

A woman in the context of her own wedding; one who is going to marry or has just been married.

(obsolete, figurative) An object ardently loved.


bride

an individual loop or other device connecting the patterns in lacework


marry

en-verb

marry (third-person singular simple present marries, present participle marrying, simple past and past participle married)

marries (present singular third-person)
marrying (participle present)
married (participle past)
married (past)

From Middle English marien, from Anglo-Norman marïer, from Latin marītāre (“to wed”), from marītus (“husband, suitor”), from mās (“man, male”), of uncertain origin. Possibly from Proto-Indo-European *méryos (“young man”), same source as Sanskrit मर्य (márya, “suitor, young man”). Compare its feminine derivatives: Welsh morwyn (“girl”), merch (“daughter”), Crimean Gothic marzus (“wedding”), Ancient Greek μεῖραξ (meîrax, “boy; girl”), Lithuanian martì (“bride”), Avestan 𐬨𐬀𐬌𐬭𐬌𐬌𐬀 (maⁱriia, “yeoman”).) Displaced native Old English hīwian.

cog

უღლდება (uɣldeba) (uniting, joining together, literally meaning joining under yoke)

devil is beating his wife and marrying his daughter

Neither of her daughters showed any desire to marry.

Evelyn, in his "Diary," under date 1641, says that at Haerlem "they showed us a cottage where, they told us, dwelt a woman who had been married to her twenty-fifth husband, and, being now a widow, was prohibited to marry in future; […] "

1641, John Evelyn, Diary, quoted in 1869 by Edward J. Wood in The Wedding Day in All Ages and Countries, volume 2, page 241

But Esau, being now forty years of age, took a false step by marrying not only without his parents consent; but with two wives, daughters of the Hittites.

1755, The Holy Bible, both Old and New Testament, Digested, Illustrated, and Explained, second edition, page 59:

If and when Suzy does marry, it will be an open marriage because she's a believer in the "totality" of freedom.

1975 March 17, Marian Christy, “Suzy Chaffee, A Liberated Beauty”, in The Lebanon Daily News:

the rich relationed hometown queen marries into what she needs

1975 July, Janis Ian (lyrics and music), “At Seventeen”:

(intransitive) To enter into the conjugal or connubial state; to take a husband or a wife.


fiancé

A man who is engaged to be married; the man to whom one is engaged.


consummate

en-adj

consummate (comparative more consummate, superlative most consummate)

more consummate (comparative)
most consummate (superlative)

From Latin cōnsummātus, past participle of cōnsummāre (“to sum up, finish, complete”), from com- (“together”) + summa (“the sum”) (see sum, summation).

a consummate sergeant

Thus[…] he loses sight of the remoter truth, that details perfect in unity, and, contributing to a final purpose, are the sign of the production of a consummate master.

1843, [John Ruskin], “Preface to the second edition”, in Modern Painters […], volume I, London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], →OCLC, page xxxii:

Many of these works are of permanent value from their nobility and beauty of style and their intrinsic emotional significance, and all are characterized by high intellectual qualities, and consummate musicianship.

1900, John Comfort Filmore, Pianoforte Music: Its history, with Biographical Sketches and Critical Estimates of its Greatest Masters, Presser, page 17:

The consummate leader cultivates the moral law, […] ; thus it is in his power to control success.

1910, Lionel Giles (translator), The Art of War, Section IV (originally by Sun Tzu)

I didn’t understand why at the time, but Jasmine is such a consummate performer and had already developed her idea of the role.

2022 December 28, Jori Finkel, “Making Intergalactic and Intergenerational Art”, in The New York Times:

At Ballet Theater, [James] Whiteside is in demand. His classical variations are high-octane sprints; he lifts ballerinas like they’re feathers. His consummate athleticism allows him to be the versatile artist he is: modern or dashing, playful or tragic.

2021 March 10, Gia Kourlas, “Ballet Is Hard Enough. What Happens When You Lose a Year?”, in The New York Times:

Supremely skilled and experienced; highly accomplished; fully qualified.


consummate

en-verb

consummate (third-person singular simple present consummates, present participle consummating, simple past and past participle consummated)

consummates (present singular third-person)
consummating (participle present)
consummated (participle past)
consummated (past)

(transitive) To make perfect, achieve, give the finishing touch.

the marriage was never consummated

After the reception, he escorted her to the honeymoon suite to consummate their marriage.

[…] in the essay which he made the very first night to serve her so as to consummate the marriage he made a false move, […]

1890, Giovanni Boccaccio, “part 10”, in James MacMullen Rigg, transl., The Decameron, volume 2:

In Christian marriage, which implies the restoration, by Christ Himself, of marriage to its original indissolubility, there can never be an absolute divorce, at least after the marriage has been consummated;

1913, Augustinus Lehmkuhl, Walter George Smith, “Divorce”, in Catholic Encyclopedia:

In a 1739 case from Laifeng County, Hubei, the widow Zhang Shi (forty-five sui) was killed by her new second husband, Jiang Changyi (forty-three sui), when she refused to consummate her marriage with him.

2000, Matthew H. Sommer, “Widows in the Qing Chastity Cult: The Nexus of Sex and Property in Law and in Women's Lives”, in Sex, Law, and Society in Late Imperial China, Stanford, Cali.: Stanford University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 187:

(transitive) To make (a marriage) complete by engaging in first sexual intercourse.

volvoer

to make a marriage complete by engaging in first sexual intercourse

(intransitive) To become perfected, receive the finishing touch.


honeymoon

desctree

→ French: lune de miel (calque)
→ German: Honigmond (calque)
→ Turkish: balayı (calque)

→ Spanish: luna de miel (calque)

From earlier hony moone, originally denoting the period of time following a wedding, equivalent to honey + moon. The original reference was to affection waning like the moon, but later the sense became "the first month, or moon after marriage", which tends to be the sweetest.
Compare Middle Low German suckermânt (“honeymoon”, literally “sugar-month”), German Low German Hönnigweken (“honeymoon”, literally “honey-weeks”). The German Honigmond (literally “honey-moon”) is a calque of French lune de miel, itself a calque of the English term.

cog

The new minister and his wife were a young, pleasant-faced couple, still on their honeymoon, and full of all good and beautiful enthusiasms for their chosen lifework.

1908 June, L[ucy] M[aud] Montgomery, “Chapter XXII: A New Departure in Flavorings”, in Anne of Green Gables, Boston, Mass.: L[ouis] C[oues] Page & Company, published August 1909 (11th printing), →OCLC:

The period of time immediately following a marriage.


annul

en-verb

annul (third-person singular simple present annuls, present participle annulling, simple past and past participle annulled)

annuls (present singular third-person)
annulling (participle present)
annulled (participle past)
annulled (past)

From Middle English annullen, from Old French anuller, from Latin annullō (“annihilate, annul”), from ad (“to”) + nūllus (“none, not any”).

(transitive) To dissolve (a marital union) on the grounds that it is not valid.


fiancée

A woman who is engaged to be married; the woman to whom one is engaged.


wedding

From Middle English wedding, weddynge, from Old English weddung (“betrothal, espousal”), equivalent to wed + -ing. Cognate with Middle Dutch weddinghe.

inh

Her announcement was quite a surprise, coming a month after she published the words "I hate weddings with a passion and a fury I can only partially explain rationally."

Simple and brief was the wedding, as that of Ruth and of Boaz.

1858, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “The Wedding-Day”, in The Courtship of Miles Standish:

Rumor has it that there will be a wedding in our village ere the daisies are in bloom.

1909, Lucy Maud Montgomery, chapter XXIV, in Anne of Avonlea:

After the wedding there was singing and concertina-playing in the laundry till late evening.

1922, Anton Chekhov, “The Cook's Wedding”, in Constance Garnett, transl., The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories:

Marriage ceremony; ritual officially celebrating the beginning of a marriage.


bachelor party

en-noun

bachelor party (plural bachelor parties)

(US, Canada, South Africa) A party held for a man who is about to be married, normally attended only by male friends and relatives.


bachelorette party

bachelorette party (plural bachelorette parties)

(US, Canada) A party held for a woman who is about to be married.


hen party

(British, Australia) A bachelorette party; a party held for a woman who is about to be married.


banns

VVhy the banns have been publiſhed, and nobody has forbidden them, 'tis true—but you know either of the parties may change their minds even after they enter the church.

1766, George Colman, David Garrick, The Clandestine Marriage, a Comedy. […], London: […] T. Becket and P. A. De Hondt, […]; R[oberts] Baldwin, […]; R. Davis, […]; and T[homas] Davies, […], →OCLC, Act II, scene ii, page 32:

The announcement of a forthcoming marriage (legally required for a church wedding in England and Wales and read on the three Sundays preceding the marriage).

The Banes which are reade beefore the beginninge of the playes of Chester, 4 June, 1600.

Historically, any public announcement of a coming event.


polyandry

polyandry (usually uncountable, plural polyandries)

The having of a plurality of husbands at the same time; usually, the marriage of a woman to more than one man, or the practice of having several husbands, at the same time.

(zoology) The mating pattern whereby a female copulates with plural males.

Sexual relations with multiple males, by a female or a male, human or non-human, within or without marriage.


uxorial

en-adj

uxorial (not generally comparable, comparative more uxorial, superlative most uxorial)

more uxorial (comparative)
most uxorial (superlative)

/ʌkˈsɔː.ɹɪ.əl/

From Latin uxōrius (“of or pertaining to a wife; overly fond of one’s wife”) + English -al (suffix forming adjectives). Uxōrius is derived from uxor (“wife”) + -ius (suffix forming adjectives).

der

Riccabocca, the wiliest and most relentless of men in his maxims, melted into absolute uxorial imbecility at the sight of that mute distress.

1853, Pisistratus Caxton [pseudonym; Edward Bulwer-Lytton], chapter XII, in “My Novel”; Or Varieties in English Life […], volume II, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book eighth, page 368:

He introduced the woman to his wife, feeling an unfamiliar uxorial pride as he did it, showing off Emily's angular beauty at forty-four to this worn and hollowed former girl, misshapen from labor and rural poverty, who might have been any age between thirty-five and fifty-five, and who had reached a plateau of endurance of which her body was a map.

2013, Thomas Keneally, chapter 19, in Shame and the Captives (A Knopf Book), North Sydney, N.S.W.: Random House Australia, →ISBN; 1st trade paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Washington Square Press, Simon & Schuster, December 2015, →ISBN, page 181:

(comparable) Devoted to one's wife; uxorious.


chuppah

en-noun

chuppah (plural chuppahs or chuppot or chuppoth)

chuppahs (plural)
chuppot (plural)
chuppoth (plural)

bor

חופה \ חֻפָּה

Hebrew חופה \ חֻפָּה (ḥuppâ)

(Judaism, figuratively) A marriage ceremony, wedding.


conjugal

/ˈkɒndʒʊɡəl/

/ˈkɑnd͡ʒəɡəl/

/kənˈd͡ʒuːɡəl/

From Middle French conjugal, from Latin coniugālis (“con- + iugum ('yoke')”).

der

"Lawgivers were never more mistaken," said Lady Mary, "than when they ordained that the conjugal tie should last through life for better and worse; the last injunction being strictly complied with. There should be septennial marriages, as well as septennial parliaments!"

1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “An Act of Parliament”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 189:

Of or relating to marriage, or the relationship of spouses; connubial.

брачен

of, or relating to marriage, or the relationship of spouses


divorce

en-verb

divorce (third-person singular simple present divorces, present participle divorcing, simple past and past participle divorced)

divorces (present singular third-person)
divorcing (participle present)
divorced (participle past)
divorced (past)

non-rhotic, without the horse–hoarse merger

Derived from Old French divorce, from Latin dīvortium, from dīvertere (“to turn aside”), from dī- (“apart”) + vertere (“to turn”); see verse.

A ship captain can marry couples, but cannot divorce them.

(transitive) To legally dissolve a marriage between two people.


nubile

en-adj

nubile (comparative more nubile, superlative most nubile)

more nubile (comparative)
most nubile (superlative)

From French nubile, from Latin nūbilis (“marriageable”), from nūbō (“marry, to take as husband”), from Proto-Indo-European *snewbʰ- (“to marry, to wed”). Possibly cognate with Ancient Greek νύμφη (númphē, “bride, young wife, nymph”) (English nymph), but this is disputed.

cog

"Pretty little thing, isn't she?" said Mrs. Budge huskily, and panted two or three times. "Yes," Denis nodded agreement. Sixteen, slender, but nubile, he said to himself, and laid up the phrase in his memory as a happy one.

1921, Aldous Huxley, chapter 28, in Crome Yellow, London: Chatto & Windus, page 292:

Of an age suitable for marriage; marriageable (principally of a young woman). [from 17th c.]


bridal

From Middle English bridale, from Old English brȳdealo (“wedding ale; wedding feast”). The attributive usage was strengthened by association with bride + -al.

inh

bridal ornaments; a bridal outfit; a bridal chamber

Of or pertaining to a bride, or to wedding; nuptial.


couple

en-verb

couple (third-person singular simple present couples, present participle coupling, simple past and past participle coupled)

couples (present singular third-person)
coupling (participle present)
coupled (participle past)
coupled (past)

From Middle English couple, from Old French couple, from Latin cōpula. Doublet of copula.

I am just going to perform a very good office, it is to assist with the archbishop, in degrading a parson who couples all our beggars

1801, Jonathan Swift, The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 14, page 59:

(transitive, dated) To join in wedlock; to marry.


white marriage

Calque of French mariage blanc. “White” is the traditional symbol of purity and therefore of virginity. It may also refer to the absence of hymenal blood on the couple’s sheets.


adultery

en-noun

adultery (countable and uncountable, plural adulteries)

With change of suffix, from the Old French adultere (“violation of conjugal faith”) (in Bernard of Clairvaux, Sermons, 12c.), a learnèd borrowing from Latin adulterium, from adulterō. Replaced the older form avoutrie, from the inherited Old French forms avouterie or aoulterie, while keeping its suffix. Compare French adultère (“adultery”). Displaced Old English ǣwbryċe. Not related to adult.

She engaged in adultery because her spouse has a low libido, while hers is very high.

So also that copulation which in one City is Matrimony, in another will be judged Adultery.

Under modern statutory law, some courts hold that the unmarried participant isn't guilty of adultery (that only the married participant is)

2009, Garner's Modern American Usage, page 22:

Ironically, the detergent industry-sponsored "soap operas" that are central to modern afternoon television programming promise (mostly) female viewers both relief from drudgery and escape into the dramatic, crisis-filled on-air world of (laundryless) marriages, adulteries, and other relationships.

2011, Elizabeth Abbott, A History of Marriage:

(strictly) Sexual intercourse by a married person with someone other than their spouse. See more synonyms at Thesaurus:cuckoldry

egbreek

sexual intercourse by a married person with someone other than their spouse


shotgun wedding

shotgun wedding (plural shotgun weddings)

From the implication that the groom was forced to the altar by shotgun-wielding relatives of the bride.

If Red Skelton's joke can still elicit laughs, it is only because there is a minority who can still remember a shotgun wedding and even recall the understandings that lay behind that insistence, now seeming quaint, that a couple sleeping together should really be married.

2012, Charles W. Dunn, American Culture in Peril, University Press of Kentucky, →ISBN, page 48:

(slang, idiomatic) A wedding in which the bride is already pregnant.

(slang, idiomatic) A wedding which is made in haste or under duress.

But all this fails when we try to have a shotgun wedding between the two great theories of nature, relativity and quantum theory.

(slang, idiomatic) Any similarly reputedly forced partnership, between people, organizations, components, or concepts.


marital

Borrowed from Middle French marital, and its source, Latin marītālis, from marītus (“husband”).

marital affairs

marital bliss

marital issues

marital pleasure

marital sex


monogamy

monogamy (countable and uncountable, plural monogamies)

From French monogamie, from Late Latin monogamia, from Ancient Greek μονογαμία (monogamía). By surface analysis, mono- + -gamy.

A form of sexual bonding involving a permanent pair bond between two beings.


white wedding

More generally, the fact that a pregnant bride does not have a full white wedding serves to confirm the respectability and ‘virginity’ of those who do.

1978, Marie P. Corbin, The Couple, page 71:

The concept of virginity is capable of arousing many associations - everything from white weddings to patriarchy – but Bob Hope's oneliner only activates one particular set, its chronological implications.

1987, Jerry Palmer, The logic of the absurd: On film and television comedy, page 71:

Oh, yes, she'd be a virgin when she married – otherwise she couldn't have a proper white wedding.

1989, Julie Mitchell, Sunday Afternoons, page 77:

Maybe she was a hypocrite, but she promoted the old-fashioned morality of virginity and white weddings to her daughter.

1989, Sandra K. Roades, Yesterday's Embers, page 152:

In this chapter I examine whether this statement applies equally to new rituals that emerged in Africa in the course of the 20th century: (a) rituals surrounding church weddings or white weddings, and (b) kitchen parties. ‘White weddings’ are church blessings of marriages that take place immediately after the traditional wedding ceremony, and ‘church weddings’ are blessings of marriages some time (in some cases many years) after the traditional wedding.

2001, Thera Rasing, The Bush Burnt, the Stones Remain: Female Initiation Rites in Urban Zambia, Lit Verlag, →ISBN, page 218:

2013, Obvious Vengeyi, "‘The Bible equals Gona’: An Analysis of the Indigenous Pentecostal Churches of Zimbabwe's magical conception of the Bible", in Joachim Kügler & Masiiwa Ragies Gunda, From Text to Practice - The role of the Bible in daily living of African people today, in Bible in Africa Studies (BiAS) 4, University of Bamberg Press (2nd ed.), →ISBN, page 91.
White weddings are also regarded as the only ‘Godly’ marriages.

2015, Rebecca Probert, "From this Day Forward? Pre-Marital Cohabition and the Rite of Marriage from the 1960s to the Present Day", in Joanna K. Miles & Perveez Mody & Rebecca Probert, Marriage Rites and Rights, Bloomsbury (1st ed.), →ISBN.
Similarly, Diana Leonard noted of her study of couples getting married in Swansea in the late 1960s that most wanted a ‘proper’ wedding—--ie a white wedding in church--—but that since seven brides were pregnant, and five men and four women had been married before, only seven out of the twenty were ‘eligible’ to marry in church (Leonard 1980: 206).

A traditional wedding ceremony, typically in a church, in which the bride wears a white wedding dress, symbolic of her virginity.


bridal shower

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-bridal shower.wav

The bridal shower will be held at the home of the bridesmaid.

(US) A party held for a bride-to-be in anticipation of her wedding, involving guests (typically female friends and relatives) giving her gifts.


bridesmaid

From bride + -s- + maid. Sports/entertainment sense: in reference to the saying always a bridesmaid, never a bride.

I'd love to be your bridesmaid at the wedding.

I was promised sex. Everybody said it. You'll be a bridesmaid, you'll get sex, you'll be fighting 'em off. But not so much as a tongue in sight.

1994, Richard Curtis, Four Weddings and a Funeral, spoken by Lydia (Sophie Thompson):

A woman who attends a bride during her wedding ceremony, as part of the main wedding party.

strooimeisie

woman who attends the bride at a wedding ceremony


maid of honor

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-maid of honor.wav

The primary woman who attends the bride at a wedding ceremony.

шаферка

the primary woman who attends the bride at a wedding ceremony


war bride

A woman who marries a man who is on active military duty in wartime; especially, a woman who marries a foreign soldier serving in her country and then emigrates to his.


uxoricide

uxoricide (countable and uncountable, plural uxoricides)

From French uxoricide or Latin uxōricīdium.

/ʌkˈsɔː.ɹɪˌsaɪd/

Terms related to familicide include filicide (the killing of one's child or children), uxoricide (the killing of one's wife), fratricide or sororicide (the killing of one's brother or sister), avunculicide (the killing of one's uncle), and nepoticide (the killing of one's nephew).

2014, Albert Lee Strickland, “Familicide”, in Michael John Brennan, editor, The A–Z of Death and Dying: Social, Medical, and Cultural Aspects, Santa Barbara, Calif.: Greenwood Publishing Group, →ISBN, pages 205–206:

In order for someone to green-light a movie of this story, they’d need to have at least background knowledge of the sexual shenanigans of Sartre and Beauvoir, and of Althusser’s uxoricide – though not necessarily a close acquaintance with their published work.

2015, Will Self, ‘Man-Eating Philosophers’, London Review of Books, volume 37, number 12:

suicide

the act of killing oneself/one who kills oneself


dowry

dowry (countable and uncountable, plural dowries)

From Middle English dowarye, dowerie, from Anglo-Norman dowarie, douarie, from Old French douaire, from Medieval Latin dōtārium, from Latin dōs.


heifer

Inherited from Middle English heyfre, hayfre, heyfer, from Old English hēahfore, hēahfru, of disputed origin; see the Old English entry for more discussion.

And the Lord ſpake vnto Moſes and vnto Aaron, ſaying, This is the ordinance of the Law, which the Lord hath commaunded, ſaying, Speak vnto the childꝛen of Iſrael, that they bꝛing thee a red heifer without ſpot, wherein is no blemiſh, and vpon which neuer came yoke.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Numbers 19:1–2:

We muſt be neat; not neat, but cleanly, Captaine: / And yet the Steere, the Heycfer^([sic]), and the Calfe, / Are all call'd Neat.

c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii], page 278:

The breath of the mountain heifer was fragrant as the gales of Sirendiep, by feeding on ſpicy herbs.

1769, Firishta, translated by Alexander Dow, Tales translated from the Persian of Inatulla of Delhi, volume I, Dublin: P. and W. Wilson et al., page iv:

A young female cow, (particularly) one over one year old but which has not calved.


trigamy

trigamy (countable and uncountable, plural trigamies)

From Ancient Greek τρίγαμος (trígamos), from τρία (tría, “three”) + γάμος (gámos, “marriage”). By surface analysis, tri- + -gamy.

The state of having three (legal or illegal) spouses simultaneously.

trigàmia

the state of having three spouses simultaneously


bigamy

bigamy (countable and uncountable, plural bigamies)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-bigamy.wav

From Middle English bigamie (“having two spouses simultaneously, bigamy; second marriage; marrying a widow or widower”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman bigamie and Middle French bigamie (“having two spouses simultaneously; second marriage; marrying a widow or widower”) (modern French bigamie (“bigamy”)), and its etymon Late Latin bigamia (“having two spouses simultaneously; second marriage”), from Late Latin, Latin bigamus (“bigamous”) + -ia (variant of -ius (suffix forming adjectives from nouns)). Bigamus is derived from bis (“twice, two times”) + Ancient Greek γάμος (gámos, “marriage; matrimony”) (from Proto-Indo-European *ǵem- (“to marry”)). The English word is analysable as bi- + -gamy.

der

Bigamie was a counterplea (deuiſed at yͤ Councell of Lyons, vpon mislike of ſecond marriage) to be obiected, when the priſoner demaundeth the benefite of the Clergie, to wit, his Book, as namely to ſay, that he which demaundeth the priuiledge of the Clergie, was married to ſuch a woman at ſuch a place, within ſuch a Dioceſſe, and that ſhee is dead, and that hee hath married another woman within the ſame Dioceſſe, or within ſome other Dioceſſe, and ſo is Bigamus.

1624, [John Rastell], “Bigamie”, in Les Termes de la Ley: Or, Certaine Difficult and Obscure VVords and Termes of the Common Lawes of This Realme Expounded. […], new edition, London: […] Company of Stationers, →OCLC, folio 45, recto and verso:

(ecclesiastical law, historical) A second marriage after the death of a spouse.


bridezilla

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-bridezilla.wav

(usually humorous) A woman who, in the course of planning her wedding, exercises or attempts to exercise a high degree of control over all major and minor details of the ceremony and reception, and makes unrealistic or outrageous demands.


betroth

en-verb

betroth (third-person singular simple present betroths, present participle betrothing, simple past betrothed, past participle betrothed or betrothen)

betroths (present singular third-person)
betrothing (participle present)
betrothed (past)
betrothed (participle past)
betrothen (participle past)

From Middle English bitrouthen, bitreuthen, from treuthe (“truth”), from Old English trēowþe (“truth, pledge, troth”). Equivalent to be- + troth.

der

He betrothed his daughter to a distant relative.

We loved each other at once, but she was betrothed to her guardian Ko-Ko, a cheap tailor.

1885, W[illiam] S[chwenck] Gilbert, Arthur Sullivan, composer, […] The Mikado; or, The Town of Titipu, London: Chappel & Co., […], →OCLC:


wedding dress

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-wedding dress.wav

The dress worn by a bride during a wedding ceremony, in Western culture traditionally white with a long train.

婚紗 /婚纱

the clothing worn by a bride during a wedding ceremony


wedding ring

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-wedding ring.wav

From Middle English wedding ring, wedding ryng, weddynge rynge, weddyng ryng.

The surgeon leant over the body, and raised the left hand. "The old story," he said, shaking his head: "no wedding-ring, I see. Ah! good night!"

1837 February, Boz [pseudonym; Charles Dickens], “Treats of the Place Where Oliver Twist Was Born, and of the Circumstances Attending His Birth”, in Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy’s Progress. […], volume I, London: Richard Bentley, […], published 1838, →OCLC, page 6:

Goodbye, old sleepyhead / I'm packing you in like I said / Take care of everything / I'm leaving my wedding ring

1947, Willard Robison (lyrics and music), “Don't Smoke in Bed”, performed by Peggy Lee:

Do the bad thing / Take off your wedding ring / But it won't make it that much easier / It might make it worse

2007, Alex Turner (lyrics and music), “The Bad Thing”, performed by Arctic Monkeys:

(jewelry) One of a pair or rings exchanged by spouses in a wedding ceremony, and afterwards worn by them, symbolizing continuous fidelity.


engaged

/ɪnˈɡeɪd͡ʒd/

/ɛnˈɡeɪd͡ʒd/

Having agreed to marry a particular person (one's fiancé or fiancée) or each other.

I tried calling, but she (or her phone) was engaged.

(British) (of a telephone) Already involved in a telephone call when a third party calls.

(of gears or cogs) in contact and in operation


wedlock

en-noun

wedlock (countable and uncountable, plural wedlocks)

From Middle English wedlok, wedlocke (“wedlock, marriage, matrimony”), from Old English wedlāc (“marriage vow, pledge, plighted troth, wedlock”). By surface analysis, wed + -lock.

inh

If I were about to marry, I should try it; that is, if I were a student of girldom with a view to wedlock for in truth, I am a marrying man.

1871, Thomas Meehan, editor, Gardener's monthly and horticulturist:

Nothing Jesus Christ more quemeth (pleaseth) Than love in wedlock where men it yemeth (keepeth);

1906, William Henry Schofield, English Literature:


matrimony

en-noun

matrimony (countable and uncountable, plural matrimonies)

From Old French matremoine, from Latin mātrimōnium (“marriage, wedlock”), from māter (“mother”) + -mōnium (“obligation”). Also matri- + -mony. Compare patrimony.

If either of you know any impediment, why ye may not be lawfully joined together in matrimony, ye do now confess it.

1549 March 7, Thomas Cranmer [et al.], compilers, The Booke of the Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacramentes, […], London: […] Edowardi Whitchurche […], →OCLC:

[…]you can play around with girls without being involved in meshes of sentiment, and you can do anything and be justified—and here am I with the brains to do everything, yet tied to the sinking ship of future matrimony.

1920 April, F[rancis] Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC, book II (The Education of a Personage), page 255:

(uncountable) Marriage; the state of being married.

ամուսնություն

marriage or the state of being married — see also marriage


out of wedlock

Some children are born out of wedlock.

(idiomatic) Of parents not legally married.


uxorious

en-adj

uxorious (comparative more uxorious, superlative most uxorious)

more uxorious (comparative)
most uxorious (superlative)

Borrowed from Latin uxōrius (“of or pertaining to a wife”), from uxor (“wife”).

bor+

With theſe in troop
Came Aſtoreth, whom the Phœnicians call'd
Aſtarte, Queen of Heav'n, with creſcent Horns;
To whoſ,e bright Image nightly by the Moon
Sidonian Virgins paid their Vows and Songs,
In Sion alſo not unſung, where ſtood
Her Temple on th' offensive Mountain, built
By that uxorious King, whoſe heart though large,
Beguil'd by fair Idolatreſſes, fell
To Idols foul.

1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 437–446:

In truth, Richard was a fond—almost an uxorious husband.

1825 June 22, [Walter Scott], Tales of the Crusaders. […], volume IV (The Talisman), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC, page 129:

Mr. Watkins Tottle was a rather uncommon compound of strong uxorious inclinations, and an unparalleled degree of anti-connubial timidity.

1836, “Boz” [pseudonym; Charles Dickens], Sketches by “Boz,” Illustrative of Every-day Life, and Every-day People. […], volume II, London: John Macrone, […], →OCLC, pages 1–2:

The king, who was a most uxorious husband, at first ridiculed the notion, but at length consented, as he did to everything else on which her majesty had set her heart.

1872, Samuel Butler, chapter XXIV, in Erewhon […] , London: Trübner & Co., →OCLC, page 226:

People smiled a little when Sir Andrew Ffoulkes' name was mentioned, some called him effeminate, others uxorious, his fond attachment for his pretty little wife was thought to pass the bounds of decorum.

1908, Baroness Orczy [i.e., Emma Orczy], The Elusive Pimpernel, London: Hutchinson & Co. […], →OCLC:

But Daylight was not unduly uxorious. He lived his man's life just as she lived her woman's life.

1910 October, Jack London, Burning Daylight, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, →OCLC:

She was the cross her cuckolded, incompatible husband had to bear, and he was—beneath those fantastic uniforms—the pathetic, uxorious human aggregate of love and good intentions, which, quite frankly, bored her most of the time.

Very devoted and possibly submissive to one's wife; exessive uxorial devotion

vaimoonsa kiintynyt

Very devoted and/or submissive to one's wife


cuckold

From Middle English cokolde, cokewold, cockewold, kukwald, kukeweld, from Old French cucuault; a compound of cucu (“cuckoo”) (some varieties of the cuckoo bird lay their eggs in another’s nest) and Old French -auld. Cucu is either a directly derived onomatopoeic derivative of the cuckoo's call, or from Latin cucūlus. Latin cucūlus is a compound of onomatopoeic cucu (compare Late Latin cucus) and the diminutive suffix -ulus.
Old French -auld is from Frankish *-wald (similar suffixes are used in some personal names within other Germanic languages as well; compare English Harold, for instance), a suffixal use of Frankish *wald (“wielder, ruler, leader”), from Proto-Germanic *waldaz (compare German Gewalt, from the related *waldą (“power, might”)), from *waldaną (“to rule”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂welh₁- (“to be strong; to rule”).
Appears in Middle English in noun form circa 1250 as cokewald. First known use of the verb form is 1589.

der

A West Indian plectognath fish, Rhinesomus triqueter.


engagement

en-noun

engagement (countable and uncountable, plural engagements)

We are enjoying a long engagement, but haven't yet set a date.

(countable, uncountable) The period of time when marriage is planned or promised.


tie the knot

en-verb

tie the knot (third-person singular simple present ties the knot, present participle tying the knot, simple past and past participle tied the knot)

ties the knot (present singular third-person)
tying the knot (participle present)
tied the knot (participle past)
tied the knot (past)

Rowena sacrificed her inclination to remain single, to her sense of duty; and contracted a second matrimonial engagement. . . . Cardinal Pandulfo tied the knot for them.

1869, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 3, in Burlesques:

After the 20-year-old mechanic tied the knot with his 18-year-old cousin, the newlyweds headed to Baghdad's Ishtar Hotel.

2002 November 25, Scott MacLeod, “Live from Baghdad”, in Time, archived from the original on 2008-04-24:

Couples tying the knot today will enjoy a marriage lasting an average of 40 years, according to an analysis of official statistics.

2019 December 15, Nicholas Hellen, “Newlyweds now stay married longer than the Victorians”, in The Sunday Times, number 10,188, page 5:

Congratulations to newlyweds Liam and Jennifer King, who surprised passengers at Manchester Oxford Road in late May when they boarded a Northern service to complete the journey from Manchester registry office (where they had just tied the knot) to their wedding celebrations in Stockport.

2022 July 13, “Stop & Examine”, in RAIL, number 961, page 71:

(idiomatic, intransitive) To marry, wed, get married.


remarry

remarry (third-person singular simple present remarries, present participle remarrying, simple past and past participle remarried)

remarries (present singular third-person)
remarrying (participle present)
remarried (participle past)
remarried (past)

After his wife's death, he never remarried.

To everyone's surprise, after being divorced for ten years the couple eloped to Las Vegas and remarried.

This church will remarry widows or widowers, but not divorcés.

To marry a second or subsequent time (the same spouse or a different one) after the end of a marriage.


pop the question

pop the question (third-person singular simple present pops the question, present participle popping the question, simple past and past participle popped the question)

pops the question (present singular third-person)
popping the question (participle present)
popped the question (participle past)
popped the question (past)

I was not able to learn what particular ceremony was observed in forming the marriage contract, but am inclined to think that it must have been of a very simple nature. Perhaps the mere "popping the question", as it is termed with us, might have been followed by an immediate nuptial alliance.

1846, Herman Melville, chapter 26, in Typee:

[A]t a pic-nic to Kenilworth, where we drank a good deal of champagne, I actually popped the question, and was accepted. In another month, Robert Stubbs, Esq., led to the altar, Leah, widow of the late Z. Manasseh, Esq., of St. Kitt's!

1850, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 9, in Stubb's Calendar, or The Fatal Boots:

If ever I do pop the question, I shall do it on the spur of the moment. There'll be no preparation with me, nor yet any beating about the bush. "Would it suit your views, my dear, to be Mrs. Spooner?" that's about the long and the short of it.

1874, Anthony Trollope, chapter 19, in Phineas Redux:

70% of men welcome the idea of women's proposing marriage; 48% of women say they'd be willing to pop the question.

2003 July 13, “He Says and She Says”, in Newsweek, retrieved 2014-02-14:

(idiomatic, informal) To propose marriage.


intermarry

intermarry (third-person singular simple present intermarries, present participle intermarrying, simple past and past participle intermarried)

intermarries (present singular third-person)
intermarrying (participle present)
intermarried (participle past)
intermarried (past)

Mainland China and Taiwan do not border each other by land; they face each other across a 140-km-wide ocean strait. Taiwan-held Dadan Island sits 2 km away from Xiamen. Xiamenese can use binoculars to observe their kinfolk on Dadan Island, with whom they have traditionally intermarried (Mellor, 1993).

2005, Xiangming Chen, “The Greater Southeast China Subregion”, in As Borders Bend: Transnational Spaces on the Pacific Rim, Rowman & Littlefield, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, pages 91–92:

To marry within the same ethnic, social, or family group.


buckle

buckle (third-person singular simple present buckles, present participle buckling, simple past and past participle buckled)

buckles (present singular third-person)
buckling (participle present)
buckled (participle past)
buckled (past)
buckle (infinitive)

The noun is derived from Middle English bokel (“spiked metal ring for fastening; ornamental clasp; boss of a shield; a shield, buckler; (figurative) means of defence”) [and other forms], from Old French boucle, bocle (“spiked metal ring for fastening; boss of a shield; a shield”) [and other forms], from Latin buccula (“cheek strap of a helmet; boss of a shield”) (from bucca (“soft part of the cheek”)).
Noun sense 2 (“great conflict or struggle”) is probably derived from verb sense 1.2.1 (“to apply (oneself) to, or prepare (oneself) for, a task or work”).
The verb is derived from Middle English bokelen, bukelen (“to fasten (something) with a buckle or clasp; to fasten, make fast; to wrap; to arch the body”) [and other forms], from bokel (noun) (see above) + -en (suffix forming the infinitive of verbs).
In verb sense 1.2.1, the sense “to apply (oneself) to, or prepare (oneself) for, a task or work” was derived from the now obsolete sense “to equip (oneself) for a battle, etc.”, and originally alluded to armour being buckled on to the body.

nb...

bocle, bocul, bocule, bocull, boculle, bogil, bogyll, bokell, bokle, bokull, bokyll, bokylle, boucle, bukel, bukkel, bukle, bukyll, bukylle

der

[T]ake my advice, and marry in the firſt place vvhere vve can find a curate; or make uſe of our friend the licentiate, vvho vvill buckle you handſomely.

1755, Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, “The Savoury Conversation that Passed between Don Quixote and His Squire Sancho Panza; with Many Other Incidents”, in T[obias] Smollett, transl., The History and Adventures of the Renowned Don Quixote. […], volume I, London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, part I, book IV, page 228:

They were hailed […] as a young strapping Irishman, conveying an ancient maiden to Dr Rigmarole's at Redriffe, who buckles beggars for a tester and a dram of Geneva.

1822 May 29, [Walter Scott], chapter II, in The Fortunes of Nigel. […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC, page 34:

(British, dialectal (especially Scotland) or humorous) To unite (people) in marriage; to marry.

Sir John diſdainfully looking at him, ſaluted him vvith theſe VVords, Farevvel Sir Knave, (for it is to be noted that it is common vvith him to term many honeſt Men ſo). My Brother anſvvered, Sir, You are no leſs. VVhereat one of Sir John’s Men buckled to fight vvith him. But Sir John ſtayed his Man.

1563, John Strype, quoting Edwin Sandys, “The Bishop of Worcester’s Vindication of Himself against Sir John Bourne, before the Privy Council. Bourne’s Imprisonment and Submission. [An Answer to a Declaration of Sir John Bourne, Kt. which He Hath Made to My Answer Uttered before Your Honours. The Said Declaration being Indeed a New and Untrue Accusation.]”, in Annals of the Reformation and Establishment of Religion, and Other Various Occurrences in the Church of England; […], volume I, London: […] John Wyat, […], published 1709, →OCLC, page 360:

The firſt thing vve doe in the morning before vve either eate or drink, or buckle about any vvorldly buſineſſe, is to put our clothes about vs: vve ſay, vve are not ready, till vve haue done that.

1623 June 21 (Gregorian calendar), Robert Saunderson [i.e., Robert Sanderson], “[Ad Magistratum.] The First Sermon. At a Publicke Sessions at Grantham Linc[olnshire] 11. June. 1623.”, in Twelve Sermons, […], [new] edition, London: […] Aug[ustine] Math[ews], for Robert Dawlman, and are to be sold by Robert Allet, […], published 1632, →OCLC, §. 6, page 132:

[For a man] to be deceiued, vvith too long Shadovves, […] And ſo to ſhoot off before the time; Or to teach dangers to come on, by ouer early Buckling tovvards them, is another Extreme.

1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Delayes. XXI.”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC, page 126:

[T]he Epicure buckles to ſtudy, vvhen ſhame, or the deſire to recommend himſelf to his Miſtreſs, ſhall make him uneaſie in the vvant of any ſort of knovvledge.

1694, [John Locke], “Of Power”, in An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding. […], 2nd edition, London: […] Thomas Dring, […]; and Samuel Manship, […], →OCLC, book II, § 43, page 139:

At laſt Eſquire South buckl'd to, to aſſiſt his Friend Nic.

1712, Humphry Polesworth [pseudonym; John Arbuthnot], “The Rest of Nic’s Fetches to Keep John out of Ecclesdoun-Castle”, in Lewis Baboon Turned Honest, and John Bull Politician. Being the Fourth Part of Law is a Bottomless-Pit. […], London: […] John Morphew, […], →OCLC, page 32:

Lickity, lickity, switch, we came to the ford, and Chiquita / Buckled right down to her work, […]

1870 March, Bret Harte, “[In Dialect.] Chiquita.”, in Poems, Boston, Mass.: Fields, Osgood, & Co., published 1871, →OCLC, page 55:

Then the sergeant let us out, and introducing us to a pile of wood and saws and axes, informed us that when this had been cut up into firewood we should get our breakfast. He sat at the door of his kitchen watching, and seeing there was nothing else for it we buckled to and soon had the job done; when we were admitted to the kitchen and given a really good meal.

1929, D[onald] J[ohn] Munro, “Nemesis”, in The Roaring Forties and After, London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co., →OCLC, page 38:

I confess that the recollection of what this bell could do when it buckled down to it gave me pause as I stood that night at 12.30 p.m. prompt beside the outhouse where it was located.

1934 October 5, P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse, chapter XXII, in Right Ho, Jeeves, London: Herbert Jenkins […], →OCLC, page 280:

To apply oneself to or prepare for a task or work.

valmistautua

to apply oneself to or prepare for a task or work

Yet thou, they ſay, for Marriage do'ſt provide: / Is this an Age to Buckle vvith a Bride?

1693, Decimus Junius Juvenalis, John Dryden, transl., “[The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis.] The Sixth Satyr”, in The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis. Translated into English Verse. […] Together with the Satires of Aulus Persius Flaccus. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson […], →OCLC, page 90:

(British, dialectal (especially Scotland) or humorous) To unite with someone in marriage; to marry.

So they buckled together, and the Heithen were diſcomfited, and fled ouer the playne felde: but the hynmoſt of them were ſlayne.

1535 October 14 (Gregorian calendar), Myles Coverdale, transl., Biblia: The Byble, […] (Coverdale Bible), [Cologne or Marburg]: [Eucharius Cervicornus and Johannes Soter?], →OCLC, 1 Macchabees iiij:[14–15], folio lxij, verso, column 1:

VVell, it chanced that the Lord Protector [Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester] and he [Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester] fell out, and the Biſhop vvould bear nothing at all vvith him, but played me the Satrapa; ſo the Regent of France vvas fain to be ſent for from beyond the ſeas, to ſet them at one, and go betvveen them: For the Biſhop vvas as able and ready to buckle vvith the Lord Protector as he vvas vvith him.

1549 March 25 (Gregorian calendar), Hugh Latimer, “Sermon VI. Being the Second Sermon Preached before King Edward VI. March the Fifteenth.”, in The Sermons of the Right Reverend Father in God, Master Hugh Latimer, Bishop of Worcester. […], volume I, London: […] J. Scott, […], published 1758, →OCLC, page 90:

In ſingle Combat thou ſhalt buckle vvith me; / And if thou vanquiſheſt, thy vvords are true, / Othervviſe I renounce all confidence.

c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii], page 98, column 2:

[B]eing armed vvith patience vvhen thou buckleſt vvith affliction or pouertie, hunger, or any croſſe ſoeuer thou canſt ſay, it is nothing to ouercome them.

1599, Lewis Thomas, “Christ Combating with Satan”, in Seauen Sermons, or, The Exercises of Seuen Sabbaoths. […], [London]: […] Valentine Simmes, →OCLC, folio 50, verso:

And as the vvhole armies vvere thus engag'd, and each man cloſely buckl'd to his antagoniſt, the battles vvere commonly very bloody, and great ſlaughter made on both ſides, but eſpecially on the vanquiſh'd.

1749 (date written), David Hume, “Discourse X. Of the Populousness of Antient Nations.”, in Political Discourses, Edinburgh: […] R. Fleming, for A[lexander] Kincaid and A[lexander] Donaldson, published 1752, →OCLC, page 189:

Algerine Porpoise […] Provoke him, and he will buckle to a shark.

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “Cetology”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 158:

(obsolete except British, dialectal) To participate in some contest or labour; to join in close fight; to contend.


buckle

en-noun

buckle (countable and uncountable, plural buckles)

Origin uncertain. Probably from Middle English bokelen (“to arch the body”), from Middle French boucler (“to bulge”, literally “to take the shape of a shield boss”), from the same ultimate origin as Etymology 1 above. In some senses, possibly from buck (“to bend, yield, buckle”) + -le (frequentative suffix).

suf

(countable) A distortion; a bend, bulge, or kink.

(roofing) An upward, elongated displacement of a roof membrane, frequently occurring over deck joints or insulation, which may indicate movement of the roof assembly.


best man

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Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see best, man.


SSM

en-noun

SSM (countable and uncountable, plural SSMs)

same-sex marriage
same-sex marriage#English


prenup

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Such tangles and many others can be avoided with a buy-sell agreement — basically a business prenup or a postnup, depending on when owners draw it up.

2008 February 20, Deborah L. Jacobs, “Making the Breakup Much Easier”, in The New York Times:

Now, let me add that I am not generally a fan of prenups for people without big assets or liabilities, or children from previous relationships.

2023 October 5, Phillip Galanes, “My Boyfriend Wants a Prenup. Can I Say No?”, in The New York Times:

prenuptial agreement
prenuptial agreement


silver wedding

A calque of German Silberhochzeit or silberne Hochzeit, first attested 1845.

The Silver Wedding! on some pensive ear
From towers remote as sound the silvery bells,
To-day from one far unforgotten year
A silvery faint memorial music swells.

1845, Arthur Hugh Clough, Ambarvalia: Poems, London: Chapman and Hall, published 1849, page 28:

‘Perhaps you have no golden or silver wedding in England?’
‘I confess I never heard of any thing of the kind,’ said Hamilton...

1850, Jemima von Tautphoeus, Initials, volume I, page 121:

The silver anniversary of a wedding, the 25th anniversary of a marriage.


prenuptial agreement

prenuptial agreement (plural prenuptial agreements)

Not so long ago, prenuptial agreements raised eyebrows. What hope was there for a marriage, the thinking went, if even before the wedding the couple were specifying who gets what in case of divorce?

2001 July 7, Tamar Lewin, “Among Nuptial Agreements, Post- Has Now Joined Pre-”, in The New York Times:

Last week, he said we should get married and that he wants a prenuptial agreement.

A legal document, signed by both parties before marriage, stating the legal claims on each other's estate upon a subsequent divorce.

婚前協議 /婚前协议

document stating legal claims upon a divorce


richly

en-adv

richly (comparative richlier or more richly, superlative richliest or most richly)

richlier (comparative)
more richly (comparative)
richliest (superlative)
most richly (superlative)

Inherited from Middle English richely, from Old English rīċlīċe, from Proto-West Germanic *rīkīlīkō, from Proto-Germanic *rīkijalīkô; by surface analysis, rich + -ly (adverbial suffix).

surface analysis

In a luxurious manner; full of majesty or expression:

In a manner that occupies the non-visual senses; flavourfully, deeply.


trophy wife

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Popularized by Julie Connelly in a 1989 Fortune magazine cover story, by analogy with a real estate trophy building.

[…] while Mrs. Scott-Baxter, his fourth (and trophy) wife, blonde and young and bored, glowered at the Baxter spawn like a mother mink in a mink farm, just waiting for a jet to strafe the facility, affording her an excuse to feign terror and eat her young.

1991, Douglas Coupland, “It Can't Last”, in Generation X, New York: St. Martin's Press, →OCLC, page 34:

But don't expect this one to break up. Arnold [Schwarzenegger] got his trophy wife—a real-life Kennedy, his entreé to the top social echelons in the country—and he's not about to let her go.

1993 March, Sally Ogle Davis, “The good, the bad and the disasters”, in Ladies' Home Journal, page 57:

‘She's with her nanny.’ ‘Oh yeah, I forgot. You're a proper trophy wife now. Staff and everything. Well…’ She produced a bottle of cava from a plastic bag. ‘With no child to keep up appearances for, let's get ourselves in the mood.’

2008, Julia Llewellyn, The Model Wife, Penguin UK, →ISBN:

She was David's fourth wife. Twenty-four years his junior, they both knew why they were together. David was filthy rich, and Belinda was a trophy wife. In fact, this was her third time around in this career: Being a trophy wife.

2013, George G. Nyman, Love Lost in Time Relativity, AuthorHouse, →ISBN, page 12:

(derogatory) A wife, usually young and attractive, regarded as a status symbol for the husband, usually older and affluent.

花瓶老婆

young attractive wife who's a status symbol for her husband


parti

...Hastily arranging her necessities, her wishes, her fears, and her desires, she thus began to address the dear friend she alike dreaded, despised, and persevered in attaching to herself and her measures:—
"Bring any one you deem a desirable parti, of course, but allow me to observe, dear Lady Penrhyn, that——"
"Yes! I see, that they must be really crême a la crême....

1838 (date written), L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XVII, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], published 1842, →OCLC, page 224:

We met some time ago a man that would just do for you, if you were not already engaged to Jonathan. He is an excellent parti, being handsome, well off, and of good birth.

1897, Bram Stoker, “Chapter 5”, in Dracula, New York, N.Y.: Modern Library, →OCLC:

“My temper is sweet, and my character without blemish. In fine, Miss Dobson, I am a most desirable parti.”

(dated) Someone (especially a man) who is considered to be a good choice for marriage, because of wealth, status etc.


yenta

Please don't tell your girlfriend what I said; she's a yenta!

And you had to marry that yenta West Side broad from a family of ward politicians and punchboard gamblers of candy-store kikes and sewer inspectors.

1976 September, Saul Bellow, Humboldt’s Gift, New York, N.Y.: Avon Books, →ISBN, page 201:

A woman who meddles in the business of others; a busybody; a female gossipmonger.


exogamy

en-noun

exogamy (countable and uncountable, plural exogamies)

From exo- + -gamy. Coined by British lawyer and ethnologist John Ferguson McLennan in his Studies in Ancient History, page 25.

coinage

marriage to a person belonging to a tribe or group other than one's own as required by custom or law


polygamous

/pəˈlɪɡəməs/


plural marriage

en-noun

plural marriage (plural plural marriages)

A form of polygamy formerly practiced by Mormons.


trousseau

trousseau (plural trousseaus or trousseaux)

Borrowed from French trousseau, diminutive of trousse (“bundle”).

Archduchess Elisabeth Marie of Austria
Franz Xaver Winterhalter
Windisch-Graetz
trousseau

Trousseaus of German Heiresses.—Despatches from Berlin told recently of the visit to that city of a wealthy German mother and her two daughters. for the purpose of buying trousseaus for the girls who are said to be perhaps the richest heiresses of the world. […] Frau Krupp, widow of the great gunmaker of Essen [Friedrich Alfred Krupp], and her daughters, Bertha and Barbara, have just been here, the object of their visit being to buy the wedding-trousseaus for her daughters.

1906 September 29, The Literary Digest, volume XXXIII, number 13 (whole no., 858), New York, N.Y.: Funk & Wagnalls Company, publishers, 44 to 60 East 23d Steet, New York, →OCLC, page 439:

Consequently, having decided to divide her daughter's trousseau into two parts, a lesser and a larger, the Princess eventually consented to have the wedding before Advent.

1918, Leo Tolstoy, Louise and Aylmer Maude, transl., Anna Karenina, a Novel (World's Classics; 211), [Cambridge?]: Oxford University Press, OCLC 6561729; republished Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998, ISBN 978-0-19-158623-1, page 435

In a study of the trousseau in France, Agnès Fine observes that, regardless of its contents and its value, the trousseau represented an essential in women's lives; through the first half of the twentieth century, at least, it seemed altogether inconceivable to be married without the provision of a trousseau. But while in the sixteenth century it involved the furniture of a bride's bedroom, bit by bit the trousseau was reduced to linen, especially to sheets.

2006, Denyse Baillargeon, translated by Yvonne Klein, Making Do: Women, Family and Home in Montreal during the Great Depression (Studies in Childhood and Family in Canada), Waterloo, Ont.: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, →ISBN, page 60:

There is further significance in the transmission of cash and trousseaux. To begin with, they appear in inverse proportion to each other across time, for example trousseaux appear more important in the eighteenth century, whereas by the 1830s they had declined in favour of cash endowments.

2006, Paul Sant Cassia, Constantina Bada, The Making of the Modern Greek Family: Marriage and Exchange in Nineteenth-century Athens (Cambridge Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 81:

The clothes and linen, etc., that a bride collects or that is given to her for her wedding and married life, especially a traditional or formal set of these.

brudeudstyr

clothes. Historically also: accessories, household items and cutlery collected by a future bride


hypergamy

hypergamy (usually uncountable, plural hypergamies)

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From 1940 to the mid-1970s, the tendency for men to marry down educationally became more pronounced and the cultural ideal of hypergamy — that women must marry up — became more insistent.

2012 November 2, Stephanie Coontz, “The M.R.S. and the Ph.D.”, in The New York Times:

Act or practice of seeking a spouse of higher socioeconomic status or caste status than oneself.


suttee

suttee (countable and uncountable, plural suttees)

From Sanskrit सती (satī́, “good and virtuous or faithful wife”), from सत् (sát, “true, good, right etc.”). In English usage since 1786. Doublet of sin.

uder

(historical, Hinduism) The traditional custom of a Hindu woman giving herself up to be cremated on her husband’s funeral pyre as a sign of her devotion.


trigamist

A person who has three spouses; someone who commits trigamy


cuckquean

Blend of cuckold + quean (“disreputable woman”).

blend

(fetish) A woman who is attracted to or aroused by the sexual infidelity of a partner.


epithalamium

en-noun

epithalamium (plural epithalamiums or epithalamia)

epithalamiums (plural)
epithalamia (plural)

/ɛpɪθəˈleɪmɪəm/

Learned borrowing from Latin epithalamium, itself borrowed from Ancient Greek ἐπιθαλάμιον (epithalámion, “bridal song”), neuter form of ἐπιθαλάμιος (epithalámios), from ἐπί (epí, “upon”) + θάλαμος (thálamos, “inner chamber, wedding chamber”).

der

Softly she laughed and sighed, and swift her glances flew. She shook her heavy tresses, and their perfume filled the place; she struck her little sandalled foot upon the floor, and hummed a snatch of some old Greek epithalamium.

1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

He has wittily redone a tardy epithalamium and some nursery rhymes ("Three blind eunuchs"), and deftly catches the cozy lawnfuls of plastic dwarfs and flamingos, outside the kenneled people.

1976, Choice - Volume 13, Issues 8-12, page 1300:


common-law marriage

en-noun

common-law marriage (countable and uncountable, plural common-law marriages)

A marriage based on the duration of cohabitation rather than formal ceremony.

vətəndaş nikahı

a marriage based on the duration of cohabitation rather than formal ceremony


elope

en-verb

elope (third-person singular simple present elopes, present participle eloping, simple past and past participle eloped)

elopes (present singular third-person)
eloping (participle present)
eloped (participle past)
eloped (past)

From Anglo-Norman aloper (“to abduct, run away”), itself borrowed from Proto-West Germanic *andihlaupan (“to run away”). Equivalent to and- + lope as well as and- + leap (these being doublets). More at lope.

der

(intransitive, of a married or engaged person) To run away from home with a paramour.

сбежа́ть

с возлюбленным

My younger sister has left all her friends-- has eloped; has thrown herself into the power of-- of Mr. Wickham.

Although Cecilia was the youngest of the surviving Thrale daughters, she had been the first to marry, eloping to Gretna Green in 1795 with John Meredith Mostyn of neighboring Llewesog Lodge. Both were underage.

1996, “Introduction”, in Edward A. Bloom, Lillian D. Bloom, editors, The Piozzi Letters: Correspondence of Hester Lynch Piozzi, 1784-1821 (formerly Mrs. Thrale), Volume 4, 1805-1810, Associated University Presses, →ISBN, page 30:

"[Molly:] —It was the same last time [You-Know-Who] was powerful, people eloping left right and centre– —Including you and Dad, said Ginny slyly."

2005, J. K. Rowling, “An Excess of Phlegm” (chapter 5), in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter; 6), Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, →ISBN, page 92:

Although they had eloped in Vegas, she'd insisted he wear a tuxedo and she buy a wedding dress at one of the local stores.

2009, Jan Springer, Intimate Stranger, Ellora's Cave, published 2009, →ISBN, page 132:

They knew each other for maybe a month before they eloped in Vegas.

2012, Shirley Jump, One Day to Find a Husband, Harlequin, published 2012, →ISBN, page 136:

(intransitive, of an unmarried person) To run away secretly for the purpose of getting married with one's intended spouse; to marry in a quick or private fashion, especially without a public period of engagement.

He had been intended by his father for trade, but his spirit, soaring above the occupation for which he was designed, from repining led him to resist, and from resisting, to rebel. He eloped from his friends, and contrived to enter the army.

That horrid girl of mine has been trying to run away. I had not a notion of her being such a little devil before, she seemed to have all the Vernon milkiness; but on receiving the letter in which I declared my intention about Sir James, she actually attempted to elope; at least, I cannot otherwise account for her doing it. She meant, I suppose, to go to the Clarks in Staffordshire, for she has no other acquaintances.

c. 1794, Jane Austen, “[Lady Susan.] XVI. Lady Susan to Mrs. Johnson.”, in J[ames] E[dward] Austen[-]Leigh, A Memoir of Jane Austen: […] to which is Added Lady Susan and Fragments of Two Other Unfinished Tales by Miss Austen, 2nd edition, London: Richard Bentley and Son, […], published 1871, →OCLC, pages 234–235:

If we'd been a bit quicker, we could have caught Gowan before he eloped

1931, Dorothy L. Sayers, The Five Red Herrings:

(intransitive, dated) To run away from home (for any reason).


quadrigamist

(rare) Someone who has four spouses at the same time.


group marriage

A form of polygynous, polyandrous marriage in which more than one man and more than one woman form a family unit.


jubilee

en-noun

jubilee (countable and uncountable, plural jubilees)

/ˌd͡ʒuːbɪˈliː/

senses 3.3 and 3.4 when spelled jubile, obsolete

Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office

From Late Middle English jubile [and other forms], from Middle French jubile, from Old French jubilee, jubileus (modern French jubilé), from Late Latin iūbilaeus (adjective, also treated as a noun), from Ancient Greek ἰωβηλαῖος (iōbēlaîos, “of a jubilee”), from ἰώβηλος (iṓbēlos, “jubilee”) + -ῐος (-ĭos, suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’ forming adjectives). Ἰώβηλος (Iṓbēlos) is derived from Hebrew יוֹבֵל (yōḇēl, “ram, trumpet made from a ram’s horn; jubilee”) (because a ram’s horn trumpet was originally used to proclaim the event; see Leviticus 25:9), influenced by Latin iūbilum (“a cry, a shout”) and iūbilō (“to cheer, shout or sing joyfully”). Cognate with Italian giubileo, Spanish jubileo.

der

(countable, African-American Vernacular, music, often attributively) A joyful African-American (usually Christian) folk song.


wedding breakfast

en-noun

wedding breakfast (plural wedding breakfasts)

the main celebratory meal held after a marriage ceremony


polygynous

/pəˈlɪd͡ʒɪnəs/

(botany) Having many styles; belonging to the order Polygynia.


avunculate

avunculate marriage

Pertaining to a marriage to one's aunt, uncle, niece or nephew.


betrothed

en-adj

betrothed (comparative more betrothed, superlative most betrothed)

more betrothed (comparative)
most betrothed (superlative)

From Middle English, equivalent to betroth + -ed.


feme covert

en-noun

feme covert (plural femes covert or femes coverts)

femes covert (plural)
femes coverts (plural)

From Anglo-Norman feme (“woman”) covert (“covered, protected”).

[…]—you, Diana Vernon, spinstress, not being a femme covert; and being a convict popish recusant, are bound to repair to your own dwelling, and that by the nearest way, under penalty of being held felon to the king—[…]

1817 December 31 (indicated as 1818), [Walter Scott], chapter IX, in Rob Roy. […], volume I, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC, pages 213–214:

A deed of a feme covert, to be valid, must be executed by the husband also.

1851, Thomas W Waterman, American Chancery Digest, volume II:

Connecticut courts failed to recognize feme couvert property rights until 1723, when the legislature finally passed an act significantly reforming the law on conveyancing.

1986, Marylynn Salmon, Women and the Law of Property in Early America:

(law, now chiefly historical) A married woman.


wedding party

The bride and groom as well as the bridesmaids and groomsmen at a wedding.

suite

the bride and groom as well as the bridesmaids and groomsmen


matrimonial

/mætɹɪˈməʊnɪ.əl/

From Middle French matrimonial, also matrimony + -al.

classified advertisement
classified advertisement

(chiefly India) A classified advertisement describing a person who wishes to find a marriage partner.


nuptial

en-adj

nuptial (comparative more nuptial, superlative most nuptial)

more nuptial (comparative)
most nuptial (superlative)

Borrowed from Latin nūptiālis (“pertaining to marriage”), from nūptiae (“wedding”), from nūbō (“I marry, I take as husband”).

bor+

To prevent the erosion of his own authority, Basil is persuaded to re-enact his father's crime — to unflower the servant girl on her nuptial night.

1988, Contemporary Dramatists, page 390:

Of or pertaining to wedding and marriage.


marriageable

en-adj

marriageable (comparative more marriageable, superlative most marriageable)

more marriageable (comparative)
most marriageable (superlative)

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Marry money, thought I to myself, who will he marry? then in my own mind I made a review of all the marriageable heiresses, and heiresses apparent, not only in Silveryville, but likewise, in a circuit several miles around it, and I could not find one among them all, who was not already engaged to be married to somebody else.

1861, G. Fort, “Our First Newspaper”, in We Four Villagers. A Tale of Domestic Life in Pennsylvania., Philadelphia, Pa.: J. S. McCalla, […], page 60:


get hitched

en-verb

get hitched (third-person singular simple present gets hitched, present participle getting hitched, simple past got hitched, past participle (UK) got hitched or (US) gotten hitched)

gets hitched (present singular third-person)
getting hitched (participle present)
got hitched (past)
got hitched (UK participle past)
gotten hitched (US participle past)

They're gonna get hitched next Saturday.

His parents flipped their lids when the two lovebugs got hitched. Jonnie couldn't stand the fact that her beautiful young son, gone so long over seas, had now tangled up with an older woman, and even worse, an older divorced woman […]

2009, Dee Kassabian, My Four Fathers and Other Short Stories, page 45:

(colloquial, intransitive) To get married, to wed.


mixed marriage

en-noun

mixed marriage (countable and uncountable, plural mixed marriages)

Marriage between people of different socially-distinguished groups, such as different races, cultures or religions.

زَوَاج مُخْتَلِط

marriage between people of different races, cultures, religions, etc

異民族間の結婚

いみんぞくかんのけっこん

(poker slang) A king and a queen of different suits as a starting hand in Texas hold 'em (see marriage (poker slang)).


connubial

en-adj

connubial (comparative more connubial, superlative most connubial)

more connubial (comparative)
most connubial (superlative)

1650s, from Latin connūbiālis, from connūbium (“marriage, wedlock”) (variants of cōnūbiālis (“pertaining to wedlock”), from cōnūbium (“marriage, wedlock”)) from com- (“together”) (English com-) + nūbō (“marry, to take as husband”) (from which nubile) from Proto-Indo-European *sneubho- (“to marry, to wed”).

der

"For my part," continued the Duke of Wharton, "I hold that the connubial system of this country is a complete mistake. The only happy marriages I ever heard of are those in some Eastern story I once read, where the king marries a new wife every night, and cuts off her head in the morning."

1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, pages 179–180:

Not gyved with connubial relations, I entered upon my migration entirely isolated, with the exception of a canine quadruped whose mordacious, latrant, lusorious, and venatic qualities, are without parity.

1856, Samuel Klinefelter Hoshour, Letters to Squire Pedant, in the East, page 13:

Of or relating to the state of being married.


betrothal

en-noun

betrothal (countable and uncountable, plural betrothals)

/bɪˈtɹəʊ.ðəl/

/bɪˈtɹəʉ.ðəl/

/bɪˈtɹɐʉ.ðəl/

The fact of being betrothed; a mutual promise, engagement, or contract for a future marriage between two people.


shadchen

From Yiddish שדכן (shadkhn), from Hebrew.


matchmaker

As singles are stuck at home and social distancing makes traditional dating all but impossible, the coaching skills of matchmakers, now imparted online, are becoming more valuable.

2020 May 9, Tammy La Gorce, “Singles Have to Think Outside the Screen”, in New York Times:

Someone who finds suitable dates or marriage partners for other people.

خَاطِب

someone who finds suitable marriage partners

Kirsten Giftekniv

used as a name. Lit: Kirsten Marriage-knife

(by extension) Someone who arranges professional boxing matches.


henpecked

en-adj

henpecked (comparative more henpecked, superlative most henpecked)

more henpecked (comparative)
most henpecked (superlative)

"I noticed that he addressed her as 'My dear,' very genially, without any trace of resentment.... The quickness of the transition made me vaguely ask myself whether he were henpecked,—a shocking conjecture, which I instantly dismissed."

June-July 1884, Henry James, “The Author of Beltraffio”, in The English Illustrated Magazine:

(particularly of husbands or boyfriends) Intimidated or overwhelmed by a nagging or overbearing matriarch, wife, or girlfriend.


cornuto

Borrowed from Italian cornuto, from Latin cornūtus (“horned”).

No, Master Brook, but the peaking cornuto / her husband, Master Brook, dwelling in a continual / 'larum of jealousy, comes me in the instant of our / encounter, after we had embraced, kissed, protested, / and, as it were, spoke the prologue of our comedy

a. 1597, William Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor, act 3, scene 5:


nuptials

From nuptial, borrowed from Latin nūptiālis (“pertaining to marriage”), from nūptiae (“wedding”) (also plural only), from nūpta, from nūbō (“to marry, to take as husband”), from Proto-Indo-European *sneubho-, *snewbʰ- (“to marry, wed”). Cognate with French noces and Italian nozze.

bor

To Night, to Night, this fatal Moment, novv / Our dreadful Father's Nuptials are preparing, / And I muſt loſe bright Monima for ever.

1678, Nat[haniel] Lee, Mithridates King of Pontus, a Tragedy: […], London: […] R[obert] E[veringham] for James Magnes and Rich[ard] Bentley, […], →OCLC, Act I, scene i, page 1:

I hope you will not think it is any manner of disrespect to your person or merit, that the intended nuptials between us are interrupted. My father says he has a much better offer for me than you can make, and has ordered me to break off the treaty between us.

1712 March 7 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “MONDAY, February 25, 1711–1712”, in The Spectator, number 310; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume IV, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, page 47:

[O]f five talents he had, gave two and a half in marriage with an only daughter he had of his own, and two and a half in marriage with the daughter of Eudamidas, and in one and the same day solemnized both their nupitals.

1842, Michael de Montaigne [i.e., Michel de Montaigne], [Antoine] Jay, [Abel-François] Villemain, “Of Friendship”, in [Charles] Cotton, transl., edited by William Hazlitt, The Works of Michael de Montaigne; Comprising; the Essays (Translated by Cotton); the Letters; the Journey into Germany and Italy; Now First Translated; a Life, by the Editor; Notes from All the Commentators; the Critical Opinions of Eminent Authors on Montaigne; the Élodies of MM. Jay and Villemain; a Bibliographical Notice of All the Editions; and Copious Indexes, London: John Templeman, 248, Regent Street, →OCLC, page 82, column 1:

This Sultan [Abdul Hamid II], who [Pierre] Loti always admired, had, according to the author, graciously and magnanimously permitted both women to choose their husbands. The cousins celebrated their nupitals together, and then moved into adjoining palaces which the Sultan had built for them.

1990, X. Türk Tarih Kongresi: Ankara, 22–26 Eylül 1986: Kongreye Sunulan Bildiriler [10th Turkish History Congress: Ankara, 22–26 September 1986: Reported to the Congress] (Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları [Turkish Historical Society Publications]; 9, 10a), volume 2, Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi [Turkish Historical Society Printing House], →ISBN, page 2318:

We got hitched many years back / […] / The rains were severe that day / and the wild winds inclement / but the nuptials still took place.

2015, John Ngong Kum Ngong, “Nuptials at Vespers”, in Nuptials at Vespers & Other Strains: Poems, Mankon, Bamenda, Cameroon: Langaa Publishing & Research Common Initiative Group, →ISBN, page 7:


newlywed

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skimmington

(obsolete) A person impersonating his/her offending spouse in a procession with the aim of ridicule.

(obsolete) A ludicrous procession for the purpose of ridiculing a person's offending spouse.


levirate marriage

en-noun

levirate marriage (countable and uncountable, plural levirate marriages)

From levirate + marriage, from Late Latin lēvir (“husband's brother”).

Levirate marriage protects a levir's sexual property and a dead man's entitlement. The former, however, serves the latter.

2008, Deborah L. Ellens, Women in the Sex Texts of Leviticus and Deuteronomy: A Comparative Conceptual Analysis, Bloomsbury, →ISBN, page 261:

A marriage in which a widow marries her late husband's brother in order to maintain the family community.


sororate marriage

sororate marriage (plural sororate marriages)

Sororate marriage is prevalent among the Hill Kharias, only after the death of the first wife and that also depends on the consent of the father-in-law and the prospective second wife.

1980, Lalita Prasad Vidyarthi, Vijay S. Upadhyay, The Kharia, Then and Now: A Comparative Study of Hill, Dhelki, and Dudh Kharia of the Central-eastern Region of India, New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company, page 138:

A marriage in which a husband engages in marriage or sexual relations with the sister of his wife, usually after the death of his wife, or once his wife has proven infertile.


wive

en-verb

wive (third-person singular simple present wives, present participle wiving, simple past and past participle wived)

wives (present singular third-person)
wiving (participle present)
wived (participle past)
wived (past)

From Middle English wiven, iwiven, from Old English wīfian, wīfiġan, ġewīfian (“to take a wife; marry”).

If he have the condition of a saint and the complexion of a devil, I had rather he should shrive me than wive me.

c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene iii]:

(transitive, intransitive) To marry (a woman).


till death do us part

Originates from the 1549 Book of Common Prayer. The original wording is "till death us depart" (using the obsolete “to separate, part” sense of depart).

nb...

and Other Rites and Ceremonies of the Churche: After the Use of the Churche of England.

Colophon: Imprinted at London in Fleetstrete, at the signe of the Sunne ouer against the conduyte, by Edvvarde VVhitchurche

(duration, idiomatic) Until death separates us; a common phrase stated between the bride and the groom at a Christian wedding, indicating a commitment to their union.

حَتَّى الْمَوْت عَلَيْنَا الْجُزْء

phrase said as part of wedding vows indicating commitment

죽음이 두 사람을 갈라 놓을 때까지

jugeumi du sarameul galla no'eul ttaekkaji


wedding cake

en-noun

wedding cake (countable and uncountable, plural wedding cakes)

A decorated cake, often in several tiers and with a model bride and groom, that is cut by the couple as part of a wedding ceremony and distributed to the guests.

wedding pie

historical antecedent to the wedding cake


companionate marriage

companionate marriage (plural companionate marriages)

A marriage in which the partners decide not to have children, and to reserve the right to divorce amicably with mutual consent.

(social history, anthropology) A conception of marriage where complicity, communication and support between spouses are considered important, rather than purely material questions of inheritance etc.


gametophobia

One phobia they don't have is gametophobia (marriage). No living-in-sin for them, only licit thrills.

1998, Rose Dorrance Beser, Why Some People Act So Stupid and What You Can Do About It, Dewey Publishing, →ISBN, page 69:

No, but supposedly i have gametophobia

2005 May 14, ChicKita [username], “Re: Are you paraskevidekatriaphobic?”, in alt.support.stop-smoking (Usenet):

The Houston vet returns to the game to confess that he suffers from gametophobia, the fear of marriage.


ringbearer

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A person who carries a ring, especially a wedding ring as part of a wedding ceremony.


extramarital

/ˌɛkstɹəˈmæɹɪtəl/


married couple

Two people who are married to each other.

ամուսնական զույգ

two people who are married to each other


pageboy

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A young male attendant at a wedding, generally between five and ten years of age.

brudedreng

young male attendant at a wedding ceremony


mariticide

From Latin maritus (“married, husband”) + -cide, from caedere (“to kill”).

The act of killing one's spouse, especially the murder of a husband by his wife.


elopement

elopement (countable and uncountable, plural elopements)

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The act of running away from home (for any reason).


groomsman

The Scotchman, who assisted as groomsman, was of course the only one present, beyond the chief actors, who knew the true situation of the contracting parties.

1866, Thomas Hardy, chapter 13, in The Mayor of Casterbridge:

1888, Horatio Alger, The Errand Boy, Chapter XIV: Consulting the Oracle,
"Philip," said Mr. Wilbur, "when I marry, I want you to stand up with me--to be my groomsman."

There were eight bridesmaids and groomsmen, and I asked McClellan and Franklin to be of the number, but distant service prevented them from coming, and Burnside and Reno, of the Ordnance, took their places.

1894, Dabney Herndon Maury, Recollections of a Virginian in the Mexican, Indian, and Civil Wars, section 6:

A man who serves as one of a number of attendants to a bridegroom at a wedding, one of whom is the best man.


morning gift

Normalisation (after morning and gift) of Middle English morgengive, morhȝive, from Old English morgenġifu, morgenġiefu (“morning gift”), from Proto-Germanic *murgnagebō (“morning gift”), equivalent to morning + gift. Cognate with Dutch morgengave (“morning gift”), German Morgengabe (“morning gift”).

inh

A gift traditionally given in some (especially Germanic) cultures by the husband to his wife on the first morning after they were married.

晨禮 /晨礼

gift given by husband to wife upon first morning of marriage


civil marriage

A marriage performed by a government official instead of by a member of the clergy.


adelphogamy

Marriage between a brother and a sister.


ball and chain

en-noun

ball and chain (plural balls and chains)

Their business model of the 1920s and 1930s, which had catapulted the business to undreamt-of heights, had then turned into something of a ball and chain.

2011, John Bradley, Cadbury's Purple Reign: The Story Behind Chocolate's Best-Loved Brand:

(figurative) Anything that restricts one's freedom or opportunities.


gay marriage

gay marriage (countable and uncountable, plural gay marriages)

Marriage between two people of the same sex.

زَوَاج مِثْلِيّ

marriage between two people of the same sex

matrimonio tra persone dello stesso sesso

małżeństwo osób tej samej płci n małżeństwo homoseksualne

matrimonio entre personas del mismo sexo


marriageability

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At fifty-eight with no children of her own [...] she wondered about the hysteria, the violence, the damnation of pregnancy without marriageability.

1992, Toni Morrison, Jazz, Vintage (2016), page 76:

Three years might make a big difference to a woman's marriageability.

2012, John Mullan, What Matters in Jane Austen?: Twenty Crucial Puzzles Solved, page 15:


bridal salon

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A retail store or boutique that specializes in selling wedding dresses to brides.


viricide

(medicine) Any substance that destroys or inactivates viruses.

viricida

any substance that destroys or inactivates viruses


marriage of convenience

marriage of convenience (plural marriages of convenience)

Widely published author and business consultant would like a marriage of convenience with a woman who is an Irish or Austrian citizen. You get legal resident status in U.S. (and eligibility for student aid), and I get eligibility for prison furloughs plus the citizenship of a neutral country in a few years so I can start a new life elsewhere.

1988 April 23, Adam Starchild, “Personal Advertisement”, in Gay Community News, page 14:

A marriage motivated by some reason other than love; for example, one conducted to obtain residence rights in a country, for financial gain, or for political purposes.


viricidal

en-adj

viricidal (comparative more viricidal, superlative most viricidal)

more viricidal (comparative)
most viricidal (superlative)

Of or pertaining to a viricide (killing of a husband)


yoked

The yoked oxen stood ready.


coverture

en-noun

coverture (countable and uncountable, plural covertures)

From Middle English, borrowed from Old French coverture, from covrir (“to cover”) or from Late Latin coopertura. Doublet of couverture.

Note that voting by widows did not raise some of the concerns that might have arisen from voting by wives subject to common-law coverture servitude to their husbands.

2006, Akhil Reed Amar, America's Constitution: A Biography:

(law, historical) A common law doctrine developed in England during the Middle Ages, whereby a woman's legal existence, upon marriage, was subsumed by that of her husband, particularly with regard to ownership of property and protection.


miai

miai (countable and uncountable, plural miais or miai)

(countable) In Japan, a formal marriage interview, marriage meeting.

相親 /相亲

formal marriage interview — see also blind date


flower girl

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rob the cradle

en-verb

rob the cradle (third-person singular simple present robs the cradle, present participle robbing the cradle, simple past and past participle robbed the cradle)

robs the cradle (present singular third-person)
robbing the cradle (participle present)
robbed the cradle (participle past)
robbed the cradle (past)

The actress, 31, also pooh-poohs the notion that she's robbing the cradle with Timberlake, 22.

2004 January 8, Karen Thomas, “Cameron won't pull a Britney”, in USA Today:

(idiomatic, disapproving) To marry or become romantically involved with a much younger person, especially one from a younger generation.


belling

From Middle English bellynge, equivalent to bell + -ing.

Bellowing; the sound of a male deer during the rutting season

(US, Indiana, Western Pennsylvania) A shivaree.


marital status

en-noun

marital status (plural marital statuses)

One of several discrete options describing a person's relationship with a significant other, such as single, married, divorced, widowed, civil union, domestic partnership, etc.


civil union

A legal union similar to marriage, established to allow same-sex couples (and, in some jurisdictions, opposite-sex couples) rights similar to those married couples have.

domestic partnership

similar arrangement in various jurisdictions


wedding planner

wedding planner (plural wedding planners)

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A person employed by a couple to assist them in planning, designing and coordinating their wedding day.


gamophobia

He has on him a perpetual gamophobia, and an instinctive antipathy to births and marriages, which makes him carefully avoid that part of the newspapers in which they so constantly appear.

1808, Edward Dubois, Fashionable Biography; or, Specimens of Public Characters by a Connoisseur, W. Lewis, page xlv:

"I've got gamophobia," Anne said. "That's fear of marriage. I should've gotten it a lot sooner. My marriages had the shelf life of buttermilk."

1997, Joseph Wambaugh, Floaters, Random House, published 1997, →ISBN, page 243:

He explained that a recent University of Indiana study indicated that almost twice as many men as women had gamophobia, fear of marriage, but that almost twice as many women as men had genophobia, fear of sex.

2005, C. L. McGranaghan, The Analyst, a Corporate Novel, →ISBN, page 57:


shivaree

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bride price

It is well known in Artas as in other villages exactly what the bride price should customarily be—so much for a cousin bride, so much more for a village bride, more still for a stranger.

1937, Grace Crowfoot, “Custom and Folk Tale in Palestine. The Dowry or Bride Price,”, in Folklore, volume 48, number 1, page 31:

Taiqian county in Henan province has issued guidelines saying grooms should pay no more than 60,000 yuan (HK$67,000) as a “bride price”, the Chinese tradition that a male partner offers money to his fiancée’s family to secure their marriage.

2017 January 4, Liu Zhen, “Don’t pay over 60,000 yuan for a bride, say Chinese officials”, in South China Morning Post, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2017-01-05, China:

Their fares across the Atlantic were paid on the understanding that when they married, their Virginian husbands would pay a bride price for them of 150 pounds of tobacco, then worth about £22 (perhaps seven years’ salary for a domestic maid).

2018 November, Lucy Moore, “Founding Mothers”, in Literary Review:

In some cultures, a sum of money or other valuables paid by a bridegroom or on his behalf to the family of the bride.

калы́м

of Russian Muslims but also some areas in Siberia


shidduch

shidduch (plural shidduchs or shidduchim)

Borrowed from Yiddish שידוך (shídekh), deriving from Hebrew שִׁידּוּךְ (shidúkh, “matchmaking”).

der

(Judaism) A system of matchmaking in which Jewish singles are introduced to each other.


engagement ring

en-noun

engagement ring (plural engagement rings)

(jewelry) A ring given to one's fiancé(e) or intended fiancé(e), signifying a promise to wed, typically a gold band with one or more diamonds or other precious stones.


merchet

From Welsh merched, plural form of merch (“daughter”).

(obsolete) In Middle Ages England, a fine paid to a lord on a daughter's marriage, in recompense for the loss of a worker.


wedding vow

The oath taken during a wedding ceremony, concluding with "I do."


ruby wedding

(uncommon) The ruby anniversary of a wedding, the 40th anniversary of a marriage.


marriage bed

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(euphemistic) Sexual activity between a married couple.