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View synonyms for

widow

[ wid-oh ]

noun

  1. a woman who has lost her spouse by death and has not remarried.
  2. Cards. an additional hand or part of a hand, as one dealt to the table.
  3. Printing.
    1. a short last line of a paragraph, especially one less than half of the full measure or one consisting of only a single word.
    2. the last line of a paragraph when it is carried over to the top of the following page away from the rest of the paragraph. Compare orphan ( def 4 ).
  4. a woman often left alone because her husband devotes his free time to a hobby or sport (used in combination). Compare golf widow.


verb (used with object)

widowed, widowing.
  1. to make (someone) a widow:

    She was widowed by the war.

  2. to deprive of anything cherished or needed:

    A surprise attack widowed the army of its supplies.

  3. Obsolete.
    1. to endow with a widow's right.
    2. to survive as the widow of.

widow

/ ˈɪəʊ /

noun

  1. a woman who has survived her husband, esp one who has not remarried
  2. informal.
    usually with a modifier a woman whose husband frequently leaves her alone while he indulges in a sport, etc

    a golf widow

  3. printing a short line at the end of a paragraph, esp one that occurs as the top line of a page or column Compare orphan
  4. (in some card games) an additional hand or set of cards exposed on the table
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

verb

  1. to cause to become a widow or a widower
  2. to deprive of something valued or desirable
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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Derived Forms

  • ˈɾǷɳǴǻ, noun
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Other Word Forms

  • ɾ·Ƿ· adjective
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Word History and Origins

Origin of widow1

First recorded before 900; (noun) Middle English wid(e)we, Old English widuwe, wydewe; cognate with German Witwe, Gothic widuwo, Latin vidua (feminine of viduus “b𲹱”), Sanskrit 󲹱 “widow”; (verb) Middle English, derivative of the noun
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Word History and Origins

Origin of widow1

Old English widuwe; related to German Witwe, Latin vidua (feminine of viduus deprived), Sanskrit 󲹱
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Idioms and Phrases

see grass widow .
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Example Sentences

Examples have not been reviewed.

Aldous Huxley, recently widowed and struggling with his grief, came to stay with Matthew and Ellen.

From

"I don't know anyone else my age that is married... never mind married and widowed."

From

“They called him aggressive, but he was the kind of defense attorney who stood up for his clients,” said Carson’s widow, Georgia DeFilippo, whose cut of the settlement is $4 million.

From

Frankie needs the money: She’s a young widow eking out a meager existence without custody of her young daughter and with an erratic condition that causes her to lose blocks of time.

From

Attorney Scott Paetty, Kamon removed $50,000 in settlement funds due a client, a widow whose husband had been killed in a boating accident, allowing the attorney to pay bills at two country clubs.

From

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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

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Widneswidow bird