octogamie
Middle English
Noun
octogamie
- a marrying eight times
- 1387–1400, Geoffrey Chaucer, “The Wyfe of Bathes Prologue”, in The Canterbury Tales, [Westminster: William Caxton, published 1478], OCLC 230972125; republished in [William Thynne], editor, The Workes of Geffray Chaucer Newlye Printed, […], [London]: […] [Richard Grafton for] Iohn Reynes […], 1542, OCLC 932884868, lines 30-34:
- Eek wel I woot, he seyde myn housbonde / Sholde lete fader and mooder, and take to me. / But of no nombre mencion made he, / Of bigamie, or of octogamie; / Why should men thanne speke of it vileynie?
- (please add an English translation of this quote)
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 The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.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 “octogamie” in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.)