bride

Pluralbrides

Formsbrides, briding, brided

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A woman at the time of her wedding, either about to marry or just married.

   The bride and groom exchanged vows in front of their families.

   Photographers spent an hour taking pictures of the bride before the reception.

   Oppositegroom, bridegroom

   Note

   The word marks a moment rather than a lasting status. It comes from Old English brȳd, a Germanic word that has meant "bride" as far back as it can be traced. George Lyttelton's An Irregular Ode (1746) turns on the difference when it weighs "how much the wife is dearer than the bride." Yet the King James Bible of 1611 calls the bride "the Lamb's wife," so the line between the two was never sharp.

2. 2
   nouncountable

   A single loop or similar link that connects the separate pattern areas in a piece of lace.

   Like the threads of a spider's web connecting the main spokes of the pattern.

   The lacemaker added a fine bride between the two floral motifs.

   A broken bride had left part of the design hanging loose.

   Similarbar, tie, leg

   Note

   A lacemaker's word with a history of its own. It was borrowed from French bride, "bridle," and has nothing to do with weddings. The image is of a strap holding things together: a small loop or bar spans the open ground so that separate motifs stay in place. Its plural, brides, is the one spot where it collides with the familiar word.

3. 3
   nounobsoletefiguratively

   A thing or pursuit loved with the deep devotion one might give a spouse.

   Like an artist married to the craft, as devoted as a spouse.

   The poet wrote of science as his bride, wedded to her in lifelong study.

   For years his garden was his bride, and he tended it with quiet passion.

   Note

   An obsolete figure that carries the devotion of the wedding sense over to a thing or a pursuit, so that a garden, a science or an art becomes someone's bride. It no longer works as ordinary vocabulary. A modern writer who calls work "his bride" is reaching for a deliberately old-fashioned metaphor, and the figure needs a possessive (his bride, her bride) to make sense.

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