Watch-birth
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A midwife. obsolete
"This Pattern pleas'd thee ſo, th' haſt fram'd by it, Th' eternall Watch-births of thy ſacred Wit: Thy pithy Book of Proverbs richly-grave, Unto the PORCH may rich relation have: For that it gives us Oeconomike Lawes, Rules Politike, and Private civill Sawes; And for (the moſt) thoſe Leſſons generall At Humane matters ayme the moſt of all."
Example
More examples"This Pattern pleas'd thee ſo, th' haſt fram'd by it, Th' eternall Watch-births of thy ſacred Wit: Thy pithy Book of Proverbs richly-grave, Unto the PORCH may rich relation have: For that it gives us Oeconomike Lawes, Rules Politike, and Private civill Sawes; And for (the moſt) thoſe Leſſons generall At Humane matters ayme the moſt of all."
Etymology
From watch + birth.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.