WIDOW • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Widow

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/wˈɪdoʊ/ Listen

noun

Widow n.

1.

A woman who has lost her husband by death, and has not married again; one living bereaved of a husband. "A poor widow."

2.

(Card Playing) In various games (such as "hearts"), any extra hand or part of a hand, as one dealt to the table. It may be taken by one of the players under certain circumstances.

Grass widow. See under Grass.

Widow bewitched, a woman separated from her husband; a grass widow. (Colloq.)

Widow-in-mourning (Zool.), the macavahu.

Widow monkey (Zool.), a small South American monkey (Callithrix lugens); so called on account of its color, which is black except the dull whitish arms, neck, and face, and a ring of pure white around the face.

Widow's chamber (Eng. Law), in London, the apparel and furniture of the bedchamber of the widow of a freeman, to which she was formerly entitled.

verb

Widow v. t. (past & past part. widowed; pres. part. widowing)

1.

To reduce to the condition of a widow; to bereave of a husband; rarely used except in the past participle. "Though in thus city he Hath widowed and unchilded many a one, Which to this hour bewail the injury."

2.

To deprive of one who is loved; to strip of anything beloved or highly esteemed; to make desolate or bare; to bereave. "The widowed isle, in mourning, Dries up her tears." "Tress of their shriveled fruits Are widowed, dreary storms o'er all prevail." "Mourn, widowed queen; forgotten Sion, mourn."

3.

To endow with a widow's right. (R.)

4.

To become, or survive as, the widow of. (Obs.) "Let me be married to three kings in a forenoon, and widow them all."

adjective

Widow adj. Widowed. "A widow woman." "This widow lady."

See images of 'Widow'

Etymology of 'Widow'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Widow" Quotes from Famous Books

... available of us for locomotion. There was considerable giggling and tittering throughout the company when Signora Fenzo, the young and comely wife of a gondolier, thus took possession of Eustace, and Signora dell' Acqua, the widow of another gondolier, appropriated me. The affair had been arranged beforehand, and their friends had probably chaffed them with the difficulty of managing two mad Englishmen. However, they proved equal to the occasion, and the difficulties ...

— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds

... who has lost her grandson by death, complains that his widow Aetheria, having married again with a certain Liberius, is wasting the property of her children in order to make her new home appear ...

— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)

... Quaestorship in B.C. 68. In this year he lost his aunt Julia, the widow of Marius, and his own wife Cornelia. He pronounced orations over both of them in the forum, in which he took the opportunity of passing a panegyric upon the former leaders of the popular party. At the funeral of his aunt ...

— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence

... a settled melancholic turn of mind, having lost in early youth a very peculiar wife. One day, whilst out hunting, he happened to pass a funeral pyre, upon which a Brahman's widow had just become Sati (a holy woman) with the greatest fortitude. On his return home he related the adventure to Sita Rani, his spouse, and she at once made reply that virtuous women die with their husbands, killed by the fire of grief, not by the ...

— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton

... tearing down the banner he had received a sword-cut across his face. The Emperor, greatly pleased, shouted to him: "You are a colonel, you are a baron, you are an officer of the Legion of Honor!" Pontmercy replied: "Sire, I thank you for my widow." An hour later, he fell in the ravine of Ohain. Now, who was this Georges Pontmercy? He was this same "brigand of ...

— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

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