Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The state of being married; matrimony.
- idiom. out of wedlock Of parents not legally married to each other: born out of wedlock.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Marriage; matrimony; the married state; the vows and sacrament of marriage. Sometimes used attributively.
- n. A wife.
- n. Synonyms Matrimony, Wedding, etc. See marriage.
- To unite in marriage; marry.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The ceremony, or the state, of marriage; matrimony.
- n. obsolete A wife; a married woman.
- v. rare To marry; to unite in marriage; to wed.
WordNet 3.0
- n. the state of being a married couple voluntarily joined for life (or until divorce)
Etymologies
- From Middle English wedlok, wedlocke ("wedlock, marriage, matrimony"), from Old English wedlāc ("marriage vow, pledge, plighted troth, wedlock"), from wedd ("pledge") + -lāc, suffix denoting activity or process, equivalent to wed + -lock. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English wedlocke, from Old English wedlāc : wedd, pledge + -lāc, n. suff. expressing activity. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“In fact — figure it out for yourself — they were actually married, by a Church of England dominie, and living in wedlock, about the same moment that you were squalling your first post-birth squalls in this world.”
“In return, he craved my antecedents and residence, pried into my private life, insolently demanded how many children had I and did I live in wedlock, and asked divers other unseemly and degrading questions.”
“Having extra marital affairs out of wedlock is a way of promoting family values, according to the Republican dictionary.”
Statement: Senator's parents 'made gifts' to mistress's family
“The President would give away his first born (in wedlock and wanted) grandchild to some sucker representative to bring in the hold out state andbingo!”
“I was born in wedlock, but all I can get from the state is a COLB, and I was born in the 1950s.”
“I can tell you where most of them aren't: in wedlock with the woman they spent a season wooing.”
“Having a child out of wedlock is indeed not d end of the world.”
“Do we want the sort of rigid social mores where a child born out of wedlock is a scandal, so the baby is snatched away at birth, and the mother sent to live in an institution for the unsound of mind?”
“I wonder what it is you ejaculate when performing your Church-approved, monogamous, heterosexual intercourse (missionary position and in wedlock only, please!), nothing but hot air?”
Official First Look: Sean Penn as Harvey Milk « FirstShowing.net
“This time, she plays a lady doctor who (among many other things) gets pregnant out of wedlock from the hunky and married Lyle Talbot.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘wedlock’.
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Words related to knowledge
Words that relate to learning, knowing, being enlightened...
revelation, eureka, awakening, idea, sapient, astute, canny, intelligent, wise, sharp, shrewd, informed and 467 more...
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End in -ock
Inspired by fbharjo (see spitchcock).
spitchcock, hillock, willock, peacock, pajock, penock, yapock, sycock, bittock, bawcock, burrock, cammock and 168 more...
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February 2012
filiopietistic, bifurcate, enclave, wedlock, decadent, unduly, defunct, lapel, tumescent, capitulation, leaden, scintilla and 83 more...
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sionnach's Words
contumely, fomite, holmgang, poltroon, eleemosynary, obsidian, nugatory, grindcore, felch, recrudescent, pyx, parenteral and 3271 more...
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dienekes's Words
chutzpah, lexicon, intrepid, pedagogical, schlemiel, schism, erudite, anathema, pugilist, jaunty, paradigm, automaton and 949 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, W
washboard, winterbourne, winze, wirble, waterway, windrow, winceyette, waft, whiffletree, wheelbarrow, whicker, wacky and 170 more...
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etymophily
Interesting gobbets of etymology
boudoir, down, sudoku, marijuana, venal, wedlock, decussate, dive, gloaming, coach, baptize, maroon and 13 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for wedlock.
fbharjo frolic(h)'s suffix surely must be related to words of this suffix. Jun 3, 2009
qroqqa Possible in the case of knowledge, with its completely mysterious second element—I suppose the older -leche could come from palatalization of a Northern form -leik of the -lock suffix, though the OED does not raise this possibility.
Shurely shome mishtake with lark, which though equally mysterious does not admit of anything like *-lak. The [v] in OE láferce might have been Norse influence; other old forms include OE láwerce, OHG lêrahha, ON lǽvirke, and this suffix won't fit in there.
The 'Rohirric' word dwimmerlaik in Tolkien's works is a use of a genuine (extinct) English word with the suffix. Jun 1, 2009
fbharjo lark and knowledge are the other two common remnants of this OE substantival word suffix Jun 1, 2009
qroqqa The only survivor in Modern English of the Old English action noun suffix -lác. This may have been a noun "play" and originated in compounds meaning "sword-play" for "battle". Jun 1, 2009