true-love
(ˈtruːlʌv)
Forms: 1 tréowlufu, 4–5 trulofe, 4–6 trewelove, trewlove, 5 treulofe, trew-luf, -lufe, pl. -luffes, treue loue, 6 tru-, treulove, 6–8 truelove, 6– true love, 7– truelove.
[f. OE. tréowe, true + lufu, love.]
1. Faithful love. Usually as two words (see true a. 1 b), exc. attrib. (see 5).
| a 800 Cynewulf Christ 538 Wæs seo treow lufu, hat æt heortan. 1813 Scott Trierm. ii. xvii, To plead their right, and true-love plight. |
2. A faithful lover; one whose love is pledged; a sweetheart, beloved.
| c 1385 Chaucer L.G.W. 2542 (Phillis) This is he..That was his trewe loue In thought & dede. c 1460 Quia amore langueo 17 in Pol. Rel. & L. Poems (1866) 151, I am treulove that fals was neuer, My sistur, mannys soule, I loued hyr thus. a 1586 Sidney Arcadia Poems (Grosart) II. 128 My true-love hath my heart, and I haue his. ? 16.. Friar of Orders Gray, I pray thee, tell to me If ever at yon holy shrine My true love thou didst see. ? 17.. Song, ‘Wala; wala, up the bank’ (Jam.), I leant my back unto an aik, I thought it was a trusty tree; But first it bow'd, and syne it brak, And sae did my true-love to me. 1871 Palgrave Lyr. Poems 73 My one true-love, My only. |
† 3. An ornament or figure symbolic of true love; a true-love knot. Obs.
| 13.. Gaw. & Gr. Knt. 612 Tortors & trulofez entayled so þyk. c 1420 Anturs of Arth. 354 (Thornton MS.) His mantylle..Trofelyte and trauerste wythe trewloues in trete. 1509 Will (MS. Prerog. Crt. Canterb.), Another standing Cupe gilt and enameled w{supt} blew Trulovys in the botom. a 1550 Image Hypocr. i. 404 in Skelton's Wks. (1843) II. 419/1 Gay gloves..Wroughte with true loves. 1575 Laneham Let. (1871) 38 His napkin, edged with a blu lace, & marked with a trulooue, a hart, and A.D. for Damian. |
4. A name for the Herb Paris (Paris quadrifolia), the whorl of four leaves with the single flower or berry in the midst suggesting the figure of a true-love knot. Also † herb true-love, true-love flower; † true-love grass, four-leaved clover. Also, † the North American genus Trillium (obs.).
| 13.. Test. Christi 126 (Vernon MS.) in Herrig Archiv LXXIX. 428 A foure-leued gras..Whon þeose four leues togeder ben set A trewe-loue men clepen hit. c 1386 Chaucer Miller's T. 3692 Vnder his tonge a trewe loue he beer For ther-by wende he to ben gracious. c 1400 Emare 125 Portrayed þey wer wyth trewe-loue-flour. 1448 Paston Lett. IV. 17 Floweris of sylver on the bukkelis made of iiij. lyke a trewlove. 1578 Lyte Dodoens i. v. 10 The seede [of Hound's-tongue] is flat and rough, three or foure together like to a trueloue, or foure leaued grasse. 1597 Gerarde Herbal ii. lxxxv. §6. 329 One Berrie is also called herbe Trueloue, and herbe Paris. a 1674 ? Herrick Fairie Kings Diet 4 The outside of his doublet was Made of the foure-leaued trueloue grass. 1760 Lee Introd. Bot. Tab. i, Trillium, Herb Truelove of Canada. 1838 M. Howitt Birds & Fl., Summer Woods iv, There grows the four-leaved plant, ‘true love’, In some dusk woodland spot. |
5. attrib. (usually in sense 1; in quot. c 1430, in sense 3). See also sense 4, and next.
| c 1430 Syr Gener. (Roxb.) 173 Of trewloue werk wroght ful wele. 1593 Shakes. Rich. II, v. i. 10 And wash him fresh againe with true-loue Teares. 1602 ― Ham. iv. v. 39 Which bewept to the graue did go, With true-loue showres. 1818 Scott Hrt. Midl. xxxv, ‘A sincere weel-wisher of mine, sir’... ‘O, I understand,’..—‘a true-love affair’. |