hedgeborn
English
Etymology
hedge + born
Adjective
hedgeborn (not comparable)
- (obsolete) Born under a hedge or of low birth.
- 1591, William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act IV, scene i]:
- Be quite degraded, like a hedge-born swine
-
- (obsolete) growing in a hedge
- 1869, George Eliot, How Lisa Loved the King
- The trader's child, whose soaring spirit rose
As hedge-born aloe-flowers that rarest years disclose
- The trader's child, whose soaring spirit rose
- 1869, George Eliot, How Lisa Loved the King
References
hedgeborn in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.