wive
Americanverb (used without object)
verb (used with object)
-
to take as wife; marry.
-
to provide with a wife.
verb
-
to marry (a woman)
-
(tr) to supply with a wife
Etymology
Origin of wive
before 900; Middle English wiven, Old English wīfian, derivative of wīf; see wife
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.
See Examples For:
The men of Padua, where Fred Graham’s Petruchio has “come to wive it wealthily,” sport brightly hued tights, exaggerated codpieces and lavishly plumed caps.
From New York Times ● May 30, 2015
But when I came, alas! to wive, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,By swaggering could I never thrive, For the rain it raineth every day.
From The Guardian ● Apr. 1, 2013
"I will not wive the daughter of a man hunted of society, and avoided by all;" he doggedly answered.
From The Headsman The Abbaye des Vignerons by James Fenimore Cooper
But when I came, alas! to wive, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, By swaggering could I never thrive, For the rain it raineth every day.
From The Home Book of Verse — Volume 1 by Burton Egbert Stevenson
One finds ugly words like "wive" and "thigh" inopportunely used, and the retort to Mr. George Moore's Hail and Farewell, though legitimately offensive, is obscure in statement.
From Old and New Masters by Robert Lynd
Ono wived by letting husbands go; she mothered her daughter by letting her go.
From New York Times ● Oct. 21, 2012
Scoffers at U. S. learning might with a modicum of justice point out that Dr. Carrel is French-born, educated and wived, that Dr. Landsteiner is Austrian-born, educated and wived.
From Time Magazine Archive
From his mother the Evening Post learned their names, and that Soso has twice wived.
From Time Magazine Archive
Well, then, without aught but bluid, ye've wived four times—" "I tall ye but thrice, Lundie.
From Pathfinder; or, the inland sea by James Fenimore Cooper
Lawst of all she wived 'er awms about, and mide a kind o' whooshin' noise.
From Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 101, November 7, 1891 by Various
Fighting, writing, digging, rigging, Hiving, wiving, nursing, versing.
From Time Magazine Archive
Unable to get along on his $150,000 yearly income from a trust fund, Dodge managed to borrow at least $10 million from his mother, Mrs. Anna Thomson Dodge, 99, to bankroll his wining and wiving.
From Time Magazine Archive
Helen Crawford is bespoke for young Farquharson of Blair, and if you have any hopes o' wiving in my house—" "Crawford, thank you for your warning, but I have no thoughts of marrying any one.
From Scottish sketches by Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
He often told himself that "hanging and wiving go by destiny."
From The Song of the Lark by Willa Sibert Cather
Looking over at the horizon, which swam in a kind of gold-dust haze below the sinking sun, he smiled thinly to himself at Purdy's ideas of wiving.
From Australia Felix by Henry Handel Richardson
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.
