childwife, child-wife
(see below)
† 1. (ˈtʃaɪldwaɪf), A woman in childbed, or who has lately borne a child. Obs.
| 1485 Inv. in J. M. Cowper Churchw. Acc. St. Dunstan's Canterb., p. xii, J candlestyke to stonde afore childwyfez. 1499 Will of Frere (Somerset Ho.), To the Ch. of S. Marg. Southwk ij cusshones of arras worke for childe wife to sitt & knele vppon. 1555 Bradford in Strype Eccl. Mem. III. App. xlv. 136 The kinge..held the child-wyfes backe while she had brought forth the chylde, and was her mydwyfe. 1566 Painter Pal. Pleas. I. 7 Let vs go..to visite the child⁓wife, and to gratulate the father. 1636 Churchw. Acc. Cundal (in N. & Q. Ser. iii. XI. 138/2) A childwife pew..26s. 8d. Note. The childwife pew we take to be the ‘some convenient place’ of the rubric where the woman was to kneel in church at the time of her thanksgiving after child-birth. |
† 2. A midwife. Obs. rare.
| 1387 Trevisa Higden (Rolls) VII. 425 Bi þe counsaile of a childe wyf [obstetricis consilio]. |
3. (ˈtʃaɪldˌwaɪf), A wife who is a child, a very young wife. (In this sense always with hyphen.)
| 1852 C. M. Yonge Cameos (1877) II. xix. 199 Mary of England, the child-wife of Montfort. 1849 Dickens Dav. Copp. xliv, ‘Will you call me a name I want you to call me?’ inquired Dora:—‘Child-wife’. |