widow

American  

[wid-oh] / ˈwɪd oʊ /

noun

1. a woman who has lost her spouse by death and has not remarried.

2. Cards. an additional hand or part of a hand, as one dealt to the table.

3. Printing.

   1. a short last line of a paragraph, especially one less than half of the full measure or one consisting of only a single word.

   2. the last line of a paragraph when it is carried over to the top of the following page away from the rest of the paragraph.

4. a woman often left alone because her husband devotes his free time to a hobby or sport (used in combination).

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verb (used with object)

widowed, widowing

1. to make (someone) a widow.

   She was widowed by the war.

2. to deprive of anything cherished or needed.

   A surprise attack widowed the army of its supplies.

3. Obsolete.

   1. to endow with a widow's right.

   2. to survive as the widow of.

widow British  

/ ˈwɪdəʊ /

noun

1. a woman who has survived her husband, esp one who has not remarried

2. informal (usually with a modifier) a woman whose husband frequently leaves her alone while he indulges in a sport, etc

   a golf widow

3. printing a short line at the end of a paragraph, esp one that occurs as the top line of a page or column Compare orphan

4. (in some card games) an additional hand or set of cards exposed on the table

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verb

1. to cause to become a widow or a widower

2. to deprive of something valued or desirable

widow Idioms  

1. see grass widow.

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• widowly
  adjective
• widowhood
  noun

Etymology

Origin of widow

First recorded before 900; (noun) Middle English wid(e)we, Old English widuwe, wydewe; cognate with German Witwe, Gothic widuwo, Latin vidua (feminine of viduus “bereaved”), Sanskrit vidhavā “widow”; (verb) Middle English, derivative of the noun

Explanation

A widow is a woman whose husband has died. If your uncle dies, your aunt will become a widow. If a person's spouse dies, that person is referred to as either a widow or — in the case of a man whose wife dies — a widower. In most cases, people stop using the word widow if the woman marries again. Back in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, it was common to use widow as a prefix to a woman's name, instead of "Mrs." The Indo-European root word of widow means "be empty."

Example Sentences

Chowdhury, a queer artist who enjoys sampling performance modes, adopts the figure of the grieving Bollywood widow.

From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 12, 2026

Bernadette Chirac, widow of former French president Jacques Chirac and known as the loyal companion of one of France's key postwar politicians, died at the age of 93, their daughter told AFP Saturday.

From Barron's • Jun. 6, 2026

The long plagiarism campaign sustained against him by Claire Goll, the widow of the poet Yvan Goll, struck at the ground on which this survivor-poet stood.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 5, 2026

Audrey Burrell, a 90-year-old widow and former volunteer, said she attended the cafe to prevent loneliness.

From BBC • Jun. 3, 2026

Fannie reported that her younger daughters attended school that year, that she was a widow and mother of four, and that she worked as a seamstress.

From "Fannie Never Flinched" by Mary Cronk Farrell