midwife
[mid-wahyf]
- a person trained to assist women in childbirth.
- a person or thing that produces or aids in producing something new or different.
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- to assist in the birth of (a baby).
- to produce or aid in producing (something new): to midwife a new generation of computers.
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Origin of midwife
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for midwife
Contemporary Examples
It means care with a mother-focused doctor or midwife, sometimes in a place other than a hospital.
Later on they came and said something else, but a midwife later told me the same [not to have more children].
Instead, he wound up being the midwife for the Soviet Union's demise.
Ex- CIA Chief: Why We Keep Getting Putin WrongEli Lake, Noah Shachtman, Christopher Dickey
March 2, 2014
MacNeal describes the relationship with her midwife—who she says she researched thoroughly—as intimate, and her births, special.
Second funniest, midwife asked me to rate my pain 1-10 periodically and at one point I said 9.
Historical Examples
On the honor of a midwife, I have seldom brought into the world one so pretty.
A Comedy of Marriage and Other TalesGuy De Maupassant
When the midwife had sipped hers up, she went off; everything was going on nicely, she was not required.
L'AssommoirEmile Zola
She said she was the daughter of a midwife at Bercy who had failed in business.
Come then to me, who am a midwife, and the son of a midwife, and I will deliver you.
TheaetetusPlato
Do you think—does it cost very much to learn to be a midwife?
The Great HungerJohan Bojer
midwife
- a person qualified to deliver babies and to care for women before, during, and after childbirth
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Word Origin
C14: from Old English mid with + wif woman
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for midwife
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
midwife
(mĭd′wīf′)- A person, usually a woman, who is trained to assist women in childbirth.
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- To assist in the birth of a baby.
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The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.
midwife
A person who serves as an attendant at childbirth but is not a physician. Some midwives (called certified nurse midwives) are trained in university programs, which usually require previous education in nursing; others (called lay midwives) learn their skills through apprenticeship.
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The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.