spouse

Pluralspouses

Formsspouses, spousing, spoused

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A married person regarded in relation to their partner; the husband or wife in a marriage.

   She named her spouse as the primary beneficiary on the insurance policy.

   Many couples open a joint account once they become spouses.

   Similarpartner

   Note

   Behind the word is a promise: Latin spōnsus and spōnsa, "bridegroom" and "bride," come from spondeō, "I vow, pledge," the root also behind sponsor and espouse. French kept separate masculine and feminine forms. English let one word cover either partner, so spouse serves where husband or wife would specify. Spenser writes of winning "that Ladie to my spouse" in 1590, and the borrowing displaced native Old English ġemaca.

2. 2
   verbdatedtransitive

   To marry; to join with another person as husband or wife.

   Do you stand possess’d Of any proof against the honourableness Of Lady Auranthe, our new-spoused daughter?

   1819, John Keats, Otho the Great

   Similarmarry, wed

   Oppositedivorce

   Note

   The verb belongs to period writing. John Keats's Otho the Great (1819) has "our new-spoused daughter," with the participle doing the work of an adjective. In present-day prose it reads as dated, and marry or wed does the plain job. Espouse, which shares its Latin "pledge" with the noun for a married partner, is its longer relative. Its forms are regular: spoused, spousing.

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