coverture
Americannoun
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a cover or covering; shelter; concealment.
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Law. the status of a married woman considered as under the protection and authority of her husband.
noun
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law the condition or status of a married woman considered as being under the protection and influence of her husband
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rare shelter, concealment, or disguise
Etymology
Origin of coverture
1175–1225; Middle English < Anglo-French, Old French. See covert, -ure
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The state cited congressional debates over the 14th Amendment’s impact on coverture laws that denied women equal citizenship.
From Slate ● May 8, 2024
For instance, textiles subverted coverture, the doctrine under which married women had no independent legal standing and anything they possessed belonged to their husbands.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 25, 2022
Pushed by fathers and influenced by the calamitous Panic of 1839, Mississippi chipped away at the restrictions of coverture that year with the first married women’s property act.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 18, 2018
But a dark shadow hovers over this ideal that harkens back to colonial times: coverture laws.
From Time ● Aug. 8, 2016
When a woman marries, we call her condition coverture, and speak of her as a femme covert.
From History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I by Stanton, Elizabeth Cady
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
