girdlestead

girdlestead

English

Etymology

girdle +‎ stead

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡɜː(ɹ)dəlˌstɛd/

Noun

girdlestead (plural girdlesteads)

1. (obsolete) That part of the body where the girdle is worn.
   • [1611?], Homer, “(please specify |book=I to XXIV)”, in Geo[rge] Chapman, transl., The Iliads of Homer Prince of Poets. […], London: […] Nathaniell Butter, OCLC 614803194; The Iliads of Homer, Prince of Poets, […], volume (please specify the book number), new edition, London: Charles Knight and Co., […], 1843, OCLC 987451361:

     sheathed, beneath his girdlestead

2. (obsolete) The lap.
   • 1882, Algernon Charles Swinburne, Tristram of Lyonesse

     There fell a flower into her girdlestead.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for girdlestead in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913)