Long Cool Coll Woman in a Black Dress Lyrics

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love, n.¹

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Pronunciation:

Forms:

α. Old English lufo (chiefly Northumbrian), Old English lufu, Old English luuu, Old English (in compounds)–Middle English luf, Old English–Middle English lufe, late Old English–Middle English luue, early Middle English leoue, early Middle English lufæ, Middle English lof, Middle English loff, Middle English loffe, Middle English lofue, Middle English louf, Middle English louo (transmission error), Middle English louue, Middle English lov, Middle English lovfe, Middle English lovue, Middle English low, Middle English lowe, Middle English lowfe, Middle English luff, Middle English luffe, Middle English lufue, Middle English 1600s lofe, Middle English (1800s– English regional and Irish English) luve, Middle English–1500s (1800s English regional (northern) and Irish English) loove, Middle English–1600s loue, Middle English– love, late Middle English lone (transmission error), 1500s looue, 1700s–1800s luive (English regional (Cumberland)), 1800s– luv (nonstandard); Scottish pre-1700 leuf, pre-1700 leuff, pre-1700 leuve, pre-1700 lof, pre-1700 lofe, pre-1700 loif, pre-1700 loiff, pre-1700 loive, pre-1700 loowe, pre-1700 lou, pre-1700 loue, pre-1700 louf, pre-1700 louve, pre-1700 lov, pre-1700 low, pre-1700 lowe, pre-1700 lowff, pre-1700 lowif, pre-1700 luf, pre-1700 lufe, pre-1700 lufee (perhaps transmission error), pre-1700 luff, pre-1700 luif, pre-1700 luife, pre-1700 luiff, pre-1700 luiffe, pre-1700 luue, pre-1700 luw, pre-1700 luwe, pre-1700 luyf, pre-1700 lwfe, pre-1700 lwff, pre-1700 lwif, pre-1700 lwife, pre-1700 1700s loove, pre-1700 1700s luffe, pre-1700 1700s luive, pre-1700 1700s– love, pre-1700 1700s– luve, pre-1700 1900s– luv.

β. Scottish pre-1700 1800s lo, 1800s lae, 1900s– lue.

Phrases

P1. In prepositional phrases, chiefly with for.

a. In asseverations and imprecations.

eOE King Ælfred tr. Boethius De Consol. Philos. (Otho) xxii. 51 Ic wille [þe oðewan] forlustlice for ðinum lufum [L. tui causa libenter].

a1225 (▸c1200) Vices & Virtues (1888) 7 (MED) I bidde and warni, for ðe luue of gode and for ȝuer lieue saule, þat ȝie hatien..ðes awerȝhede senne.

a1400 (▸a1325) Cursor Mundi (Vesp.) l. 14683 (MED) For þin dedes gode..We wil noght stan þe..Bot for þine werkes gain þe lau And for þe luue o þi missau.

▸ a1470 T. Malory Morte Darthur (Winch. Coll. 13) (1990) II. 891 We shall destroy all the knyghtes of kyng Arthurs..for the love of sir Galahad.

c1480 (▸a1400) St. Placidus 163 in W. M. Metcalfe Legends Saints Sc. Dial. (1896) II. 74 Sa hyme, for þe luf of me, þat in my nam he baptis þe.

1548 Hall's Vnion: Henry V f. lxii Required the Englishe lordes for the loue of God that the truce might continue.

1589 J. Jane in R. Hakluyt Princ. Navigations iii. 790 The Sauages came to the Island..and tore the two vpper strakes, and caried them away onely for the loue of the iron in the boords.

1661 W. Ames Good Counsell & Advice 12 Let none have occasion to say, that for the love of your goods, your liberty or your lives, any of you have forsaken the way of truth.

1710 J. Swift Jrnl. to Stella 8 Dec. (1948) I. 115 I begged Mr. Harley for the love of God to take some care about it.

1786 S. Henley tr. W. Beckford Arabian Tale 96 For the love of Mahomet, my dear Fakreddin, have done!

1859 Ld. Tennyson Vivien in Idylls of King 115 A Table Round, That was to be, for love of God and man And noble deeds, the flower of all the world.

1882 Cent. Mag. Feb. 488/1 For the love of heaven do something for me or I'll die, so I will.

1913 J. London God of his Fathers 69 For the love of your mother, hold your say, man.

1941 E. Linklater Man on my Back iii. 41 Can you not see that bloody machine-gun there? And for the love of God put your sights up.

1960 G. Durrell Zoo in my Luggage (1965) viii. 173 Don't, for the love of Allah, let her get into the china department.

1999 D. Mitchell Ghostwritten 340 'Oh for the love of God you two,' muttered John.

eOE—1999(Hide quotations)

1901 S. Crane in Home Mag. N.Y. Jan. 77/2 'For the love of Mike, madam, what ails you?' he spluttered.

1909 Syracuse (N.Y.) Herald 21 Dec. For the love of Mike, man, haven't you got a heart?

1922 J. Joyce Ulysses iii. xviii. [Penelope] 727 O move over your big carcass out of that for the love of Mike listen to him.

1925 T. Dreiser Amer. Trag. I. i. ix. 57 For de love o' Mike, will you listen to dat, now.

1934 J. Brophy Waterfront i. 14 For the love of mike..shut those blasted windows.

1942 R.A.F. Jrnl. 3 Oct. 11 Tired? Well for the love of mike! What about me?

1957 A. MacNab Bulls of Iberia xv. 181 For the love of Mike, let's hope he's brave.

1999 J. Burchill Married Alive xii. 181 'Why wasn't she wearing any fucking clothes!' I scream at the top of my voice. 'Because she was under a waterfall, for the love of Mike—'.

1901—1999(Hide quotations)

a1400 (▸a1325) Cursor Mundi (Trin. Cambr.) l. 20380 Whi wepestou, what is þe? For alle loues [a1400 Vesp. For felaured, a1400 Gött. For felauschip] telle now me.

c1450 (▸c1400) Sowdon of Babylon (1881) 1587 (MED) Sir, for alle loues, Lete me thy prisoneres seen!

1565 T. Cooper Thesaurus Amabo..Of felowshippe: of all loues: I pray the: as euer thou wilte doe me good turne.

1618 J. Ussher Let. in R. Parr Life J. Usher (1686) Coll. xxxiii. 64 I do intreat you of all Love, to look over the first Edition.

1624 R. Montagu Immediate Addresse 185 She..intreateth him that was worshipped vpon the Altar, of all loves, mercies, and works of wonder, to restore her vnto her health.

a1627 T. Middleton Chast Mayd in Cheape-side (1630) iii. 31 O sweet Father, for Loues sake pittie me.

c1646 in 2nd Rep. Royal Comm. Hist. MSS (1874) 87/1 [10l.] which I desire you of all love to pay upon sight of this my letter.

1655 J. S. tr. B. della Rovere Phillis of Scyros iii. iv. 63 For loves sake, doe not press me to relate So long a story now.

1748 S. Richardson Clarissa IV. li. 257 For your own honour's sake, as well as for love's sake, join with me.

1793 C. Smith Old Manor House IV. viii. 196 Madam..begged him of all love to leave the country for fear of accidents.

1829 W. Whewell in J. M. Douglas Life & Corr. W. Whewell (1881) 133 Beg her of all love to establish herself in a more collegiate part of Cambridge.

1871 E. S. P. Ward Silent Partner iv. 86 Here a minute, for love's sake, Catty.

1906 B. Carman Pipes of Pan 51 Gentle spirit, grieve not so, for love's sake!

1925 A. Lowell Sword Blades & Poppy Seeds 132 Christine clung to him with sobbing cries, Pleading for love's sake that he leave her not.

1973 P. O'Brian H.M.S. Surprise iv. 62 Am I in childbed, for all love, that I should be plagued, smothered, destroyed with caudle?

1992 Ottawa Citizen (Nexis) 8 Sept. d8 Buckle up, for love's sake!

a1400—1992(Hide quotations)

?1529 R. Hyrde tr. J. L. Vives Instr. Christen Woman i. xvi. sig. T. ij They that marie for loue, shall leade their lyfe in sorowe.

1791 J. Boswell Life Johnson anno 1776 II. 45 [Johnson] It is commonly a weak man who marries for love.

1868 Sat. Rev. 14 Mar. 340/2 It is only the old-fashioned sort, not girls of the period pur sang, that marry for love.

1946 G. Hopkins tr. F. Mauriac Woman of Pharisees ix. 100 The dead woman was still in his eyes a heroine who might have died for love but would never have been false to her plighted word.

2005 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 6 Oct. 43/2 Lavransdatter′s..plot might be summarized as the story of a Daddy's girl who refuses Daddy's choice of a husband and marries for love.

?1529—2005(Hide quotations)

[ OE Blickling Homilies 43 Ne wandige na se mæssepreost..ne for feo, ne for nanes mannes lufon.

c1400 (▸c1378) W. Langland Piers Plowman (Laud 581) (1869) B. i. 101 And neuer leue hem for loue ne for lacchyng of syluer.

1609 T. Dekker Guls Horne-bk. sig. E3^v If you can (either for loue or money) prouide your selfe a lodging by the water side.

1691 T. Shadwell Scowrers ii. i. 11 This lewd Cozen of ours..has had all the women in Town that are to be had for Love or Money.

1712 J. Swift Jrnl. to Stella 7 Aug. (1948) II. 553 No more Ghosts or Murders now for Love or Money.

1751 T. Smollett Peregrine Pickle II. lxxxvi. 251 I'll be revenged of you, if there be a man to be had for love or money.

1837 F. Palgrave Merchant & Friar (1844) i. 18 Any person who, for love or money, might be induced to take the letter in his charge.

1869 F. A. March Compar. Gram. Anglo-Saxon Lang. Pref. iv He let me..use..Anglo-Saxon texts not elsewhere to be had for love or money.

1928 Times 30 Aug. 8/4 It appears to be impossible to get a hold of a useful rabbit-chasing ferret, for love or money.

1966 H. Davies New London Spy (1967) 93 Gigolos are unobtainable in London for love or money, but unemployed actors and male models may be had by the desperate.

1997 C. B. Divakaruni Mistress of Spices 248 You couldn't buy them from a dealer, not for love or money.

?1576—1997(Hide quotations)

1678 S. Butler Hudibras: Third Pt. iii. i. 58 For these, at Beast, and L'hombre, [you] wooe, And play for Love, and Money too.

1813 Sporting Mag. 41 296 A match of..single-stick, was played..for what is technically termed Love and a Belly-full.

1823 C. Lamb New Year's Eve in Elia 63 I play over again for love, as the gamesters phrase it, games, for which I once paid so dear.

1843 C. Dickens Martin Chuzzlewit (1844) xxxii. 383 Mrs. Todgers..proposed that..they should play for 'love'.

1879 H. C. Merivale Lady of Lyons i. 4 Points be bothered, I plays for love.

1930 Daily Gleaner (Kingston, Jamaica) 22 Oct. 8/3 She would be surprised to know that those games [sc. poker and twenty-one] were played for love.

1958 G. Greene Our Man in Havana (1962) 154 He really does all this for love. You see, I saved his life once.

a1969 J. Kerouac Visions of Cody (1992) 12 Jack Kerouac didn't write this book for money, he wrote it for love, he gave it away to the world.

2007 Northern Miner (Austral.) (Nexis) 30 Jan. 7 They were disappointed they were only playing 'for love' because scores wouldn't be officially registered.

1678—2007(Hide quotations)

P2. In prepositional phrases with in, into, out of.

OE tr. Apollonius of Tyre (1958) i. 2 Þa ða se fæder þohte hwam he hi mihte healicost forgifan, þa gefeol his agen mod on hyre lufe mid unrihtre gewilnunge [L. pater..incidit in amorem filiae suae].

c1500 (▸?a1437) Kingis Quair (1939) xlv So ferr ifallyng into lufis dance.

?1515 Hyckescorner (de Worde) sig. A.v Than in to loues daunce we were brought.

1530 J. Palsgrave Lesclarcissement 544/2 I shall fall in love with her.

1569 R. Grafton Chron. I. iv. 37 Locryne fell in great phancy and loue with a faire Damosell.

1580 J. Lyly Euphues & his Eng. (new ed.) f. 63^v Of which water who so drinketh shall be caught in loue.

1596 E. Spenser Second Pt. Faerie Queene iv. vi. Argum. sig. E8^v He sees her face; doth fall in loue, and soone from her depart.

1606 G. W. tr. Justinus Hist. xliii. 134 With the pleasantnesse of which, they were so taken in loue, that [etc.].

1675 J. Bunyan Light for Them that sit in Darkness 171 Can you behold a Crucified Christ and not Bleed, and not Mourn, and not fall in Love with him?

1724 M. Davys Reform'd Coquet 165 You are the first Woman under Thirty that ever fell in love with a grey Beard.

1768 F. Burney Early Jrnls. & Lett. (1988) I. 25 A young lady of fashion..has fallen in love with my cousin.

1785 E. Inchbald Appearance is against Them i. ii. 11 You are a fellow that falls in love with every face you see.

1833 T. S. Fay Crayon Sketches II. 7 The most wretchedly romantic youth that ever fell in love..and turned his face moonwards.

1887 H. R. Haggard Jess iv. 31 John Niel was no chicken, nor very likely to fall in love with the first pretty face he met.

1928 Daily Express 21 Feb. 9/2 There is a suggestion that he has fallen in love with a 'shiksa' (a Christian girl).

1969 E. Cleaver Post-prison Writings 23 I fell in love with the Black Panther Party immediately upon my first encounter with it.

1999 S. Orbach Impossibility of Sex (2000) 170 She feared that Charles and Maria would really hit if off; they would fall in love again, want to keep the baby, shut her out.

OE—1999(Hide quotations)

▸ a1398 J. Trevisa tr. Bartholomaeus Anglicus De Proprietatibus Rerum (BL Add.) f. 146^v Whanne þe swan is in loue, sche secheþ the female and plesiþ hire wiþ byclippinge of þe necke.

?1507 W. Dunbar Tua Mariit Wemen (Rouen) in Poems (1998) I. 46 He is for ladyis in luf a right lusty schadow.

1577 B. Googe tr. C. Heresbach Foure Bks. Husbandry i. f. 5 He would talke..of the stories of the Scripture, so sweetely..as I was woonderfully in loue with him.

1581 G. Pettie tr. S. Guazzo Ciuile Conuersat. (1586) iii. 140 A woman cannot possibly doe any thing y^t may make her husband more in love with her, then to play the good huswife.

1664 S. Butler Hudibras: Second Pt. ii. i. 20 Quoth she, Y' have almost made m' in love With that, which did my pitty move.

1690 J. Locke Ess. Humane Understanding iv. xvii. 347 He that believes, without having any Reason for believing, may be in love with his own Fansies.

1728 J. Gay Beggar's Opera i. x. 15 What, is the fool in love in earnest then?

1797 M. Robinson Walsingham III. xlviii. 19 She is in love with you, my noble fellow.

1828 T. B. Macaulay Hallam's Constit. Hist. in Edinb. Rev. Sept. 113 Its conduct, we are told, made the excellent Falkland in love with the very name of parliament.

1881 L. B. Walford Dick Netherby xvii. 213 He was not himself in love.

1896 A. E. Housman Shropshire Lad xviii. 25 Oh, when I was in love with you, Then I was clean and brave.

1911 M. Beerbohm Zuleika Dobson iii. 28 Her soul was as a flower in its opetide. She was in love.

1941 P. Hamilton Hangover Square ii. i. 52 He was head over heels in love with her as soon as he had a moment to be near her.

1969 J. McPhee Levels of Game 10 He is in love with his work. He knows the exact height and tensile strength of the corporate ladder.

1996 Rolling Stone 18 Apr. 80/1 They trudge dutifully through the tacky clichés of legal eagles in love.

a1398—1996(Hide quotations)

1577 A. Golding tr. J. Calvin Serm. Epist. Ephesians xli. f. 292 Thou bee so farre out of loue with thy sonne [Fr. tu es si desbordé contre ton fils], that thou art vnwylling too see him.

1581 G. Pettie tr. S. Guazzo Ciuile Conuersat. (1586) i. 10 Hee seemeth either too farre in loue with himselfe, or to farre out of loue with others.

1680 E. Fowler Libertas Evangelica ii. vii. 80 Atonement is..a most effectual means, to this farther End, the making us out of love with Sin.

1722 D. Defoe Relig. Courtship i. i. 5 What's the matter, that you are so out of love with the World all on a sudden?

1753 S. Richardson Hist. Sir Charles Grandison III. xi. 83 Lord W.'s animosity to my father made him out of love with his name.

1796 S. Lee Almeyda iv. i. 52 I, like thee, Grow out of love with reason.

1814 M. Edgeworth Patronage I. ix. 278 Bellamy tells me the strangest story of her having been, since I left London, in love and out of love with John Falconer.

1867 A. Cary Bishop's Son x. 192 Perhaps every man who is out of love thinks pretty much after this fashion of his friend who is in love.

1890 J. Todhunter Sicilian Idyll i. 8 Hope shuns me: I am out of love with life.

1914 B. Carman Earth Deities 72 Whatever can have come his way To put him out of love to-day?

1955 R. Campbell in E. W. Tedlock D. Thomas (1960) i. 45 He was never out of love with his beautiful wife and muse, Caitlin.

1992 A. V. Roberts Morning's Gate xvi. 282 In and out of love with amazing regularity and unflagging enthusiasm, Polly was passionate about most things.

1577—1992(Hide quotations)

1596 J. Harington New Disc. Metamorph. Ajax sig. Ciiij^v (I heard of a truth, that a great Lady that loued Parsnips very well, after she had heard how they grew, could neuer abide them) and I would be loath, to cause any to fall out of loue with so good a dish.

a1653 H. Binning Serm. in Wks. (1735) 284/2 God never begins to be pleasant and lovely to a Soul, til it begins to fall out of Love with itself, and grow lothsome in its own Eyes.

1701 R. Calder Schola Sepulchri 38 The belief of the Resurrection will teach us to fall out of Love with the World,..there is nothing in it but Vanity and Miserie.

1856 Littell's Living Age 5 July 34/2 No man falls out of love so safely as a man who falls in love with a beauty.

1877 Catholic World July 530/1 He was always falling in love with any pretty face that struck his fancy, and then just as easily falling out of love with an unwounded heart.

1915 Amer. Anthropologist 17 601 Despite our ingenuity, we do grow up, we grow old, we fall in love, we fall out of love.

2002 Times 11 Feb. i. 13/2 There are signs that voters have fallen out of love with the party.

1596—2002(Hide quotations)

1631 J. Weever Anc. Funerall Monuments 417 He also departed this world, in the loue of all good men.

a1635 R. Sibbes Light from Heaven (1638) iii. 54 I know I am in the love of Christ: these are favours that hee bestowes onely upon his owne.

1647 S. Richardson Saints Desire Ep. Ded., sig. )(3 The people of God are in the love of God.

1664 W. Smith Briefe Answer unto Shetinah 28 We are in the love of God, and have fervent love to him, and one another.

1631—1664(Hide quotations)

P3. With to make.

a. to make love [after Old Occitan far amor (13th cent.), Middle French, French faire l'amour (16th cent.; 1622 with reference to sexual intercourse), or Italian far l'amore] .

1567 G. Fenton tr. M. Bandello Certaine Tragicall Disc. f. 155^v The attire of a Cortisan, or woman makynge loue [Fr. femme qui fait l'Amour].

1580 J. Lyly Euphues & his Eng. (new ed.) f. 34^v A Phrase nowe there is which belongeth to your Shoppe boorde, that is to make loue.

a1616 W. Shakespeare Hamlet (1623) v. ii. 58 Why man, they did make loue to this imployment.

1663 A. Cowley Hymn to Light ii Thou golden Shower of a true Jove! Who does in thee descend, and Heav'n to Earth make love!

1695 W. Congreve Love for Love iv. i. 70 Nay, Mr. Tattle, If you make Love to me, you spoil my design, for I intended to make you my Confident.

1712 J. Addison Spectator No. 517. ¶2 The Widow Lady whom he had made Love to.

1768 L. Sterne Sentimental Journey I. 79 You have been making love to me all this while.

1784 R. Bage Barham Downs II. 318 You..may make love, and play your pitty patties.

1829 W. Cobbett Advice to Young Men iv. §181 It is an old saying, 'Praise the child, and you make love to the mother'.

a1845 T. Hood Poems (1846) I. 213 Oh there's nothing in life like making love.

1860 Sat. Rev. 9 306 How often..do we make love to the charms of cousins and avuncular expectations.

1887 W. Besant World Went xiv. 112 He would crack the crown of any man who ventured to make love to his girl.

1906 H. Green At Actors' Boarding House 209 I thought I'd die laughing at his making love..and me with a husband doing his bit back in Auburn.

1927 L. Mayer Just between us Girls vii. 43 Honestly those nobilities can make love divinely.

1948 W. S. Maugham Catalina (1958) ii. 18 Her lover Diego no longer came to the window at night to make love to her through the iron grille.

1972 B. Everitt Cold Front v. 38 'Are we conversing or making love?'.. 'Let's go into the slow lane for a minute.'

1991 S. Cisneros Woman Hollering Creek 153 Ay! To make love in Spanish, in a manner as intricate and devout as la Alhambra.

1567—1991(Hide quotations)

1927 J. S. Bolan Deposition in L. Schlissel 3 Plays Mae West (1997) 218 Jimmy embraces Margie LaMont and goes through with her the business of making love to her by lying on top of her on a couch, each embracing the other.

1929 E. Hemingway Farewell to Arms xviii. 114 Besides all the big times we had many small ways of making love and we tried putting thoughts in the other one's head while we were in different rooms.

1934 'G. Orwell' Burmese Days iv. 54 Why is master always so angry with me when he has made love to me?

1950 M. Peake Gormenghast xxix. 173 One of the Carvers made love to her and she had a baby.

1967 B. Wright tr. R. Queneau Between Blue & Blue xiv. 151 When you make love on a bunk,..the man has to bump his head.

1971 Daily Tel. 15 Jan. 17/1 Couples who make love frequently are more likely to have sons than those who do so less often.

1986 D. Johnson Stars at Noon (1987) i. 17 Making love with him was like passing through a patch of fog.

1999 T. Parsons Man & Boy (2000) ii. 19 We were making love on the floor—or the futon, as Gina called it.

1927—1999(Hide quotations)

1965 Oakland (Calif.) Tribune 12 Mar. 19/1 You've seen those bumper stickers... And the latest in Berkeley, protesting Viet Nam, simply say 'Make Love—Not War.'

1966 Times 2 Sept. 12/2 They intend to distribute badges stating 'Make Love, not War'—a slogan used by C.N.D.

1970 Washington Post 14 Aug. b1/1 People [at Woodstock] got together.., shared food, water and dope, enjoyed music and conversation and made love, not war.

1982 Times 27 Jan. 8/7 Dr Comfort..believes that it [sc. recreational sex] may drain away aggression, as in the hippy slogan 'Make Love Not War'.

2005 M. O'Connor Bitch Posse xx. 158 All those big houses in the subdivisions are filled with former hippies who said Make Love Not War and Never Trust Anyone over Thirty.

2007 Daily Tel. (Nexis) 24 Mar. (Sport section) 10 Football is one of the few areas of national life where Arabs and Jews happily work and play together... 'It shows people that we should make love and not war.'

1965—2007(Hide quotations)

1615 F. Beaumont & J. Fletcher Cupids Revenge iv. i. sig. I4 As you finde him setled, remember my loue and seruice to his Grace.

1618 T. Sherwin Let. in S. Purchas Pilgrimes (1625) III. viii. 733 Remember my loue to all at Faire-hauen.

1630 J. Winthrop Hist. New Eng. (1825) (modernized text) I. 378 Commend me to all our friends. My love and blessing to your brother and sisters [etc.].

1635 in B. Cusack Everyday Eng. 1500–1700 (1998) 247 With M^r Gorges loue and myen to my daughter and your selfe.

1665 Earl of Marlborough Fair Warnings 3 I beseech you commend my love to all mine acquaintance.

1742 Observ. Methodists 20 Give my dear Love to my dear Band Brethren.

1765 W. Cowper Let. 14 Aug. (1979) I. 111 My Love to all your Family.

1773 J. Wesley Let. 7 Oct. (1931) VI. 49 My wife sends her love; she has her old companion the gout.

1785 Lady Newdigate Let. May in A. E. Newdigate-Newdegate Cheverels (1898) iv. 67 Love from all here Adieu.

1793 W. Cowper Let. 24 Feb. (1984) IV. 298 With Mary's kind love.

1819 R. Southey Select. from Lett. (1856) III. 3 Love from all to all, and kisses as many as you please to give to the kissable part of the family.

1836 C. Dickens Pickwick Papers (1837) ix. 89 Love to Tuppy.

1854 W. Collins Hide & Seek (1861) 183 'I will write and comfort your mother this very afternoon ——' 'Give her my love', interposed Zack.

1875 'M. Twain' Let. 23 Nov. (1917) I. xv. 268 We-all send love to you-all.

1911 W. Owen Let. 20 Sept. (1967) 83 Love to Mary and me brethren twain.

1921 A. Huxley Let. 21 Nov. (1969) 205 I will telephone or write about both these dates. Love from Aldous.

1949 D. Smith I capture Castle (U.K. ed.) xi. 188 Dear Cassandra, it was nice of you to write... Love from Neil.

1970 T. Southern Blue Movie iii. iv. 151 'Hans sends his love,' Angela was saying, across the candlelit dining table.

2004 Daily Mail (Nexis) 11 Aug. 31 Give my love to Daddy if you see him.

1615—2004(Hide quotations)

OE Ælfric Catholic Homilies: 1st Ser. (Royal) (1997) ix. 252 Ærest he him ondræt hellewite & bewepð his synna syððan he nimð eft lufe to gode: þonne onginð he to murcnienne & þincð him to lang hwænne he beo genumen of þyses lifes earfoðnyssum, & gebroht to ecere reste.

OE tr. Vitas Patrum in B. Assmann Angelsächsische Homilien u. Heiligenleben (1889) 197 Ða gelicode him sona ðurh deofles tihtince þæs hæþenan sacerdos dohtor. Began þa niman swyðe micle lufe to hyre and to hyre fæder gewænde and hy him to gemæccan gyrnde.

▸ c1440 S. Scrope tr. C. de Pisan Epist. of Othea (St. John's Cambr.) (1970) 66 Meede..took so greete loue to Jason that be þe enchauntementis þat sche couthe..made charmes & lerned Jason to enchaunte.

1694 N. H. Ladies Dict. 48/1 Another Dolphin, in the same manner, took love to a Child upon the Sea coast near to Pusoll.

OE—1694(Hide quotations)

P6. Proverbial uses.

c1405 (▸c1395) G. Chaucer Merchant's Tale (Hengwrt) (2003) l. 354 For loue is blynd alday and may nat see.

1661 J. Glanvill Vanity of Dogmatizing xiii. 119 And, that Love is blind, is extensible beyond the object of Poetry.

1746 A. Arbuthnot Mem. Miss Jenny Cameron 110 No, no, said Jenny; though Love is blind, I never heard that he was deaf.

1848 E. Bennett Trapper's Bride xi. 94 Love is blind, says the old proverb.

1898 J. D. Brayshaw Slum Silhouettes 35 They say as luv is blind.

1965 J. M. Brewer Worser Days 166 I don't make love by the garden gate, For love is blind, but the neighbors ain't.

2000 J. J. Connolly Layer Cake (2004) 62 Aha, makes sense to you but love is blind, my friend.

c1405—2000(Hide quotations)

[ 1578 J. Lyly Euphues f. 31^v Anye impietie may lawfully be committed in loue, which is lawlesse.]

1620 T. Shelton tr. M. de Cervantes 2nd Pt. Don Quixote xxi. 138 Loue and warre are all one [Sp. el amor y la guerra son vna misma cosa]: and as in warre it is lawful to vse sleights and stratagems to ouercome the enemy: So in amorous strifes and competencies, Impostures and iuggling tricks are held for good, to attaine to the wished end.

1717 W. Taverner Artful Husband (new ed.) ii. 38 All advantages are fair in Love and War.

1789 Relapse I. xvi. 140 Tho' this was a confounded lie, my friend, 'all is fair in love and war'.

1845 G. P. R. James Smuggler I. iv. 95 In love and war, every stratagem is fair, they say.

1850 F. E. Smedley Frank Fairlegh xlix. 434 All's fair in love and war, you know.

1905 Washington Post 9 June 2/5 New Yorker so busy wooing he forgot he had no funds. 'All is fair in love and war,' holds good in fiction, but not in the eyes of the police.

1979 'J. Gash' Grail Tree v. 45 All's fair in love, war and antiques.

2005 Cosmopolitan Aug. 218/1 All's fair in love and war, so flick the trip switch in the fuse box. Without electricity, he's forced to surrender his console and get back to basics.

1620—2005(Hide quotations)

1474 W. Caxton tr. Game & Playe of Chesse (1883) iii. iii. 97 Herof men saye a comyn prouerbe in england, that loue lasteth as longe as the money endureth.

▸ ?a1500 R. Henryson tr. Æsop Fables: Cock & Fox l. 512 in Poems (1981) 23 The prouerb sayis, 'Als gude lufe cummis as gais.'

1573 J. Sanford tr. L. Guicciardini Garden of Pleasure f. 98^v Foure things cannot be kept close, Loue, the cough, fyre, and sorrowe.

1584 R. Greene Morando sig. B.iv^v Loue doth much but money doth all.

a1618 W. Raleigh Remains (1664) 35 Love needs no teaching.

1678 J. Ray Coll. Eng. Prov. (ed. 2) 55 Love ne're delights in a sorrowful man.

1732 T. Fuller Gnomologia 140 Love and Pride stock Bedlam.

1777 C. Dibdin Quaker i. viii. 16 According unto the proverb, love maketh a wit of the fool.

1863 'G. Eliot' Romola I. i. i. 102 If there are two things not to be hidden—love and a cough—I say there is a third, and that is ignorance.

1941 A. Kreymborg Poetic Drama Introd. 4 'The path of true love never runs smooth' in the drama.

1994 R. Davies Cunning Man 458 Love and a cough cannot be hid.

2007 EveningNews (Edinb.) (Nexis) 8 Mar. 1 Many people say 'love conquers all' but that's not always true.

1474—2007(Hide quotations)

P7. there's no love lost between them (also us, etc.) .

c1640 R. Davenport Surv. Sci. in Wks. (1890) 327 Oh my sweete! Sure there is no loue lost when yo^u two meete.

1696 W. Bates Acct. Life P. Henry (1699) 8 Dr. Busby..took a particular Kindness to him,..and there was no Love lost betwixt them.

1706 P. Motteux Don Quixote (1749) III. 266 I love him well, and there's no love lost between us.

1749 T. Smollett tr. A. R. Le Sage Gil Blas III. ix. vii. 229 I have a friendship for you..And I can assure thee, child, (said I), there is no love lost [Fr. que tu n'aimes pas un ingrat].

1773 O. Goldsmith She stoops to Conquer iv. 77 As for murmurs, mother, we grumble a little now and then, to be sure. But there's no love lost between us.

1824 N. Drake Noontide Leisure II. 54 Give me your hand..and let me tell you..there is no love lost between us.

1828 C. Lamb New Year's Coming of Age in Elia 2nd Ser. 8 There was no love lost for that matter.

1839 S. Lover Hall Porter ii. i. 17 I'm obleeged to you, Misther Bowlt; and in throth there's no love lost between us, for I respect you, and always did.

1600—1839(Hide quotations)

?1622 J. Taylor Trav. Twelve-pence in Wks. (1630) i. 71 They loue me not, which makes 'em quickly spend me. But there's no great loue lost 'twixt them and mee, We keepe asunder and so best agree.

1751 S. Richardson Clarissa (ed. 3) III. xxv. 134 He must needs say, there was no love lost between some of my family and him; but he had not deserved of them what they had of him.

1797 Posthumous Daughter I. xlii. 217 I do not like him at all, and I believe there is no love lost between us.

1858 W. M. Thackeray Virginians I. xvii. 134 There was not a great deal of love lost between Will and his half-sister.

1866 W. D. Howells Venetian Life 121 Americans do not like these people and I believe there is no love lost on the other side.

1889 T. A. Trollope What I Remember III. 91 Between Italian and French radicals there is really no love lost.

1916 J. Buchan Greenmantle xiii. 203 Once or twice he ran counter to Moellendorff, and I could see there was no love lost between these two.

1956 J. Lister Cent. of Conflict xvi. 273 There was no love lost between the seamen and soldiers of the mother country and the colonists, and the sooner the expedition moved on, the happier everyone would be.

1997 'Q' Deadmeat 54 There was no love lost between the two of us. We'd never got on.

?1622—1997(Hide quotations)

[ a1413 (▸c1385) G. Chaucer Troilus & Criseyde (Pierpont Morgan) (1881) ii. l. 668 How myght it be That she so lyghtly louede Troylus Right for þe firste syght.

a1593 C. Marlowe Hero & Leander (1598) i. 175 Where both deliberat, the loue is slight, Who euer lov'd, that lov'd not at first sight?]

1664 T. Killigrew Comedies & Trag. (title) The princesse: or, Love at first sight.

1753 S. Richardson Hist. Sir Charles Grandison IV. xviii. 144 Love at first sight, answered Sir Charles, must indicate a mind prepared for impression, and a sudden gust of passion.

1797 T. Holcroft Adventures Hugh Trevor V. vi. 70 Why this seems like love at first sight!

1822 W. Hazlitt Table-talk II. xvi. 354 I do not think that what is called Love at first sight is so great an absurdity as it is sometimes imagined to be.

1839 C. Brontë Let. 4 Aug. in E. C. Gaskell Life C. Brontë (1857) I. viii. 199 Well! thought I, I have heard of love at first sight, but this beats all!

1868 W. Collins Moonstone I. i. vii. 91 You have heard of beautiful young ladies falling in love at first sight, and have thought it natural enough.

1952 Scrutiny 18 273 We know that what we have here is no drama of romantic love-at-first-sight.

1961 C. McCullers Clock without Hands iv. 89 In early youth, love at first sight, that epitome of passion, turns you into a zombie.

1975 D. Bagley Snow Tiger xvi. 138 Don't you believe in love at first sight?

2005 Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 12 Feb. (Life section) 4/4 Phenylethylamine (PEA): A neurotransmitter which often causes the lover's 'high' many interpret as love at first sight.

1664—2005(Hide quotations)

1819 Times 24 Sept. 1/1 A concert, selected from the Scotch and Irish Melodies... Song, 'Love's young Dream'.

1821 T. Moore Love's Young Dream in Irish Melodies i. 77 But there's nothing half so sweet in life, As love's young dream!

1898 J. K. Jerome Second Thoughts 155 The stout lady, now regarded as a would-be blighter of love's young dream, was hustled into the back seat.

1920 J. Galsworthy Skin Game i. 33 I don't mean any tosh about love's young dream; but I do like being friends.

1937 D. L. Sayers Busman's Honeymoon xv. 307 There now!.. If there ain't love's young dream a-comin' up the path.

1974 P. G. Wodehouse Aunts aren't Gentlemen iii. 20 I was helping a pal to celebrate the happy conclusion of love's young dream, and it may be that I became a mite polluted.

2001 J. Paisley Not for Glory 54 Noo I hink we shouldnae make nae mair noise an disturb love's young dream up aheid.

1819—2001(Hide quotations)

1745 C. Coffey Devil upon Two Sticks i. vi. 34 Love in a Cottage contentedly flows, And e'ery dear Minute is blest.

1763 G. Colman Deuce is in Him i. 9 To talk of living on bread and water, and the comforts of love in a cottage.

1812 M. Edgeworth Absentee iv, in Tales Fashionable Life V. 302 Lady Clonbrony had not..the slightest notion, how anybody..could prefer, to a good house..and a proper establishment, what is called love in a cottage.

1878 Scribner's Monthly Dec. 274/1 Young people tried love in a cottage, and dwelt in dove-cotes beside their prouder kinsfolk.

1894 H. H. Gardener Unofficial Patriot 239 Here's more love in a cottage business for you.

1938 W. Empson Eng. Pastoral Poetry i. 55 She had chosen love in a cottage and could stick to it.

1954 J. A. Banks Prosperity & Parenthood viii. 116 George Vavasor, Phineas Finn, and Frank Greystock were not faced with the dilemma of love in a cottage versus luxury in the hall.

2006 Times (Nexis) 1 July 18 A choice between a triumphant return to high finance and love in a cottage.

1745—2006(Hide quotations)

[ 1705 J. S. City & Country Recreation x. 58 Love in Disguise, and how esteemed, and the Danger there is in it more than when it appears in its naked Form.]

1877 E. S. Dallas Kettner's Bk. of Table 282 Love in disguise is a calf's heart stuffed, then surrounded with forcemeat, next rolled in vermicelli, lastly deposited in a baking dish..and sent to the oven.

1937 Times 5 June 16/5 'Love in Disguise' concealed within it a stuffed sheep's heart—an eighteenth-century culinary jest.

1958 W. Bickel tr. R. Hering Dict. Classical & Mod. Cookery 451 Love in disguise , calf's heart, soaked in water, larded, boiled until tender, dried, coated with veal forcemeat, rolled in crushed raw noodles, roasted in butter in oven and basted frequently.

1995 N.Y. Times (Nexis) 23 July vii. 14 British cuisine has always sounded entertaining. But, like love-in-disguise (which turns out to be baked, stuffed calf heart), what winds up on the plate can be harder to swallow.

1877—1995(Hide quotations)

P12. the love that dare not speak its name and variants.

1894 A. Douglas Two Loves in Chameleon Dec. 28 I am the love that dare not speak its name.

1895 O. Wilde in Oscar Wilde: Three Times Tried (1912) ii. xiii. 271 The 'Love that dare not speak its name' in this century is such a great affection of an elder for a younger man as there was between David and Jonathan... It is in this century..so much misunderstood that it may be described as the 'Love that dare not speak its name'.

1895 M. Beerbohm Let. 3 May in Lett. to R. Turner (1964) 102 [Oscar's] speech about the Love that dares not tell his name was simply wonderful, and carried the whole court right away, quite a tremendous burst of applause.

1950 N.Y. Times Bk. Rev. 29 Jan. 6/1 Gide's second proposition, that civilization benefits by toleration of 'the love that dares not speak its name.'

1976 Evening Capital (Annapolis, Maryland) 28 Oct. Their 'loves'..were of the offbeat persuasion—you know, 'the love that dare not speak its name'.

2001 Village Voice (N.Y.) (Nexis) 5 June 41 We know too little about plural marriage to say that it inevitably results in pain... What gives Utah the right to repress this love that dare not speak its name?

2002 H. M. Benshoff in M. Jancovich Horror ii. vii. 99 The 'love that dare not speak its name' remains a shadowy Other which conversely works to bolster the equally constructed idea of a normative heterosexuality.

1894—2002(Hide quotations)

1977 Times 27 May 2/8 Government ministers were privately 'terribly fond of the arts'. Could that..be the sort of love that dare not speak its name?

1989 Independent (Nexis) 13 Dec. (Sport section) 28 In an age of hooliganism..football enthusiasm became the love that dare not speak its name.

1994 Chicago Sun-Times (Nexis) 25 Sept. (Late Sports Final ed.) (Show section) 13 It's the love that dares not speak its name. No sane rocker would admit to loving the Carpenters.

2004 A. King London Jrnl. i. i. 11 'Slumming', whereby a culturally respectable reader takes pleasure in mass-market reading, was in the nineteenth-century a love that dare not speak its name.

1977—2004(Hide quotations)

Compounds

A selection of some of the more significant compounds is given here.

C1. General attributive.

1820 P. B. Shelley Prometheus Unbound i. i. 56 Dreaming like a love-adept.

1918 D. H. Lawrence New Poems 53 The delicate love-adept Can warm her hands and invite her soul.

1969 L. P. Hartley (title) The love-adept: a variation on a theme.

1820—1969(Hide quotations)

1612 T. Shelton tr. M. de Cervantes Don-Quixote: Pt. 1 iv. xxiv. 581 In Loue adventures [Sp. en los casos de amor] no one is accomplished with more facilitie, then that which is fauoured by the womans desire.

1653 T. Urquhart tr. F. Rabelais 1st Bk. Wks. liv. 238 Here enter not, fond makers of demurres In love-adventures.

1710 Ld. Shaftesbury Soliloquy 114 In relation to common Amours and Love-Adventures.

1772 in G. Keate Poet. Wks. (1781) 172 These Indentures Now settle,—sign,—and seal all Love Adventures.

1821 C. Lamb in London Mag. Jan. 5/2 It is better that I should have pined away..than that so passionate a love-adventure should be lost.

1900 W. C. Russell (title) Rose Island. The strange story of a love adventure at sea.

1965 C. N. Eze (title) Little John in the love adventure.

1612—1965(Hide quotations)

1897 Amer. Jrnl. Philol. 18 471 The Temple of Glass..follows the rules of the fashionable Love-Allegory.

1933 R. Tuve Seasons & Months iv. 189 All this is to be found in the love-allegory of the Golden Targe.

2003 Mod. Lang. Rev. 98 p. xxxv Vogt..credits him [sc. Gottfried von Strassburg] with the creation of the secular love allegory.

1897—2003(Hide quotations)

1565 T. Cooper Thesaurus at Amor Componere amores..To make loue balades.

a1654 A. Ross Πανσεβεια (1655) viii. 238 The Canticles was not Scripture, but a Love Ballade between Solomon and one of his Concubines.

a1668 W. Davenant Distresses ii. i in Wks. (1673) iii. 42/1 He makes My love Ballads. The merry Madrigal For Maids, and the Vicious Virgin, were both his.

1876 Musical Times Aug. 565/1 Such a poem as will puzzle the warblers of 'love ballads' to unravel.

2000 Stud. Eng. Lit. 1500–1900 40 521 The rhythm is singsong, in the familiar pattern of love ballads.

1565—2000(Hide quotations)

a1616 W. Shakespeare Richard III (1623) iii. vii. 72 He is not lulling on a lewd Loue-Bed [1597 day bed].

1642 S. Rutherford Peaceable Plea To Rdr. sig. a2 O that Christ would enlarge his Love bed.

a1788 W. J. Mickle Siege of Marseilles in Poems & Trag. (1794) iv. iii. 308 Leave th' Adulterer in triumphant riot In your love bed, drunk with Erminia's charm's.

1874 A. C. Swinburne Bothwell i. i. 41 I had rather the close moon and stars anight Lit me to love-bed.

1934 D. Thomas 18 Poems 19 Invisible, your clocking tides Break on the lovebeds of the weeds.

a1963 S. Plath Crossing Water (1971) 33 Musky as a lovebed the morning after.

a1616—a1963(Hide quotations)

a1350 in G. L. Brook Harley Lyrics (1968) 51 (MED) Suete Iesu..hou swete bueþ þi loue-bonde.

c1400 Bk. to Mother (Bodl.) 50 Tak to þe þe swete childe and swetliche swaþ hit in his gradil wiþ swete loue bondes.

1595 W. Lisle tr. S. G. de Senlis in tr. G. de S. Du Bartas Babilon 23 The knot and loue-bond of nations [Fr. l'vnion et amitié des peuples], is so loosened and broke, that scarce is there founde any remedie for it.

a1869 R. Leighton Reuben (1875) ii. ii. 69 I'll break this love-bond slowly, so that he May never know the breaking.

1951 L. MacNeice tr. J. W. von Goethe Faust ii. v. 295 Rapture which yearns ever, Love-bond which burns ever.

2000 Jrnl. Econ. Lit. 38 477/2 Discusses how human economics grows out of natural increase; the love bond and the meaning of zero.

a1350—2000(Hide quotations)

1798 S. T. Coleridge Nightingale in W. Wordsworth & S. T. Coleridge Lyrical Ballads 66 He were fearful, that an April night Would be too short for him to utter forth His love-chant, and disburthen his full soul Of all its music!

2001 Dayton (Ohio) Daily News (Nexis) 22 Sept. (Entertainm. section) c3 A series of mock meditations, yogic exercises and..tantric love chants.

1798—2001(Hide quotations)

a1627 T. Middleton Witch (1950) i. ii. 24 Thou com'st for a loue-charme now?

1708 P. Bayly Misc. Reflections I. 59 He sent to Market for a kind of Fish which they judg'd to be a sovereign Love-charm.

1821 W. Scott Kenilworth II. v. 133 They are spoken in a mad tale of fairies, love-charms, and I wot not what besides.

1948 B. G. M. Sundkler Bantu Prophets S. Afr. vi. 222 Various Native 'Chemist' shops sell..love-charms.

1994 Malahat Rev. Spring 110 Lucille made love charms from their petals to put in bath water.

a1627—1994(Hide quotations)

c1450 (▸c1380) G. Chaucer House of Fame (Fairf. 16) (1878) l. 1235 Ther saugh I fames olde and yonge Pipers of alle Duche tonge To lerne loue Daunces sprynges Reus and these straunge thynges.

1712 J. White Restoration All Things 58 How doth this still..confirm that Account before given of a Love Design or project, a mask of Love, a Love Dance?

1911 J. A. Thomson Biol. Seasons ii. 233 The long larval period of two or three years in the water, and the short aerial love-dance lasting for an evening or two.

2001 Australian 1 May (Brisbane ed.) 3/2 Her exotic Indian love dance was described as 'undancerly' and unco-ordinated.

c1450—2001(Hide quotations)

1591 J. Harington in tr. L. Ariosto Orlando Furioso xxvii. 223 (note) It alludes to a like thing, written by Plutarch in his loue discourses.

1687 R. L'Estrange tr. A. de Castillo Solórzano in Spanish Decameron viii. 462 He entred into some Love Discourses with her.

1787 J. Cobb Eng. Readings 23 A confab between Romeo and Juliet—a bit of love discourse, eh?

a1864 J. Clare Cottage Tales (1993) 125 The maids resumed their love discourse anew.

1990 South Atlantic Rev. 55 99 In the Petrarchan love discourse molding the European poetic imagination of the Renaissance.

1591—1990(Hide quotations)

a1586 Sir P. Sidney Astrophel & Stella (1591) 35 In hir necke you did loue ditties peepe.

1694 N. H. Ladies Dict. at Singing A Fidler..gained a fortune..by procuring and humming over some Love ditties.

a1711 T. Ken Christophil in Wks. (1721) I. 476 I..Who for Two thousand Years, or rather more, Have sung the like Love-ditties o're and o're.

1798 W. Jackson Four Ages xxv. 358 That peculiarly fine melody appropriated to the hundredth psalm, was sung to a popular love-ditty.

1808 W. Scott Marmion i. vii. 29 And frame love ditties passing rare.

1890 E. S. Hartland Sci. Fairy Tales (1891) i. 7 The women at their wheels; and while they spin they sing love ditties.

2005 TNT Mag. 7 Mar. 66/1 But the tunes are mere grains of sand, while the lyrics are abysmal, winsome little love ditties.

a1586—2005(Hide quotations)

[ c1390 Swete Ihesu Now (Vernon) l. 20 in C. Horstmann Yorkshire Writers (1896) II. 10 Þou make in me þi loue-dreem [v.r. luf-drem].]

1602 T. Dekker Blurt Master-Constable 24 Dreame of her, loue-dreames are nere too deepe.

1794 T. Holcroft Adventures Hugh Trevor I. xvi. 218 Olivia in danger: love dreams: fanatic horrors.

1866 R. D. Blackmore Cradock Nowell (1881) xii. 48 A maiden with the love dream nestling beneath the bridal faldetta.

1932 N. Coward Younger Generation in B. Day N. Coward: Compl. Lyrics (1998) 153/3 Though the world is well lost for love dreams There's wisdom above dreams To compensate mothers and wives.

2005 P. Clifford Deciphering Eros 307 Truly figured in the West's finest love dream is the narcissistic heaven dreamed of by the eternal children the lovers have succeeded in remaining.

1602—2005(Hide quotations)

1856 Putnam's Monthly Mag. May 557 What is an opera without a love duel between the tenor and the baritone?

1932 R. Campbell Taurine Provence ii. 44 The great 'Lou Pouvenco'..bore a small fortune between his horns, until he was killed in a love-duel by a younger rival.

2001 G. Adelman Retelling Dostoyevsky iii. 123 He evokes in his love duel..Ivan's relationship with Katerina.

1856—2001(Hide quotations)

1863 Cornhill Mag. Sept. 305 A similar defect..strikes me in the love-duet which succeeds.

1975 Times 12 Feb. 23/6 The dance of Discord and War..has to be reconciled by the love duet.

1863—1975(Hide quotations)

1616 B. Holyday tr. Persius Satyres sig. B6 Weak Love-elegies, such as Rome's nobles speak [L. non siqua elegidia crudidictarunt proceres?].

1684 N. Lee Constantine Great sig. A4^v (advt.) Virgil's Eclogues, Ovid's Love-Elegies, Odes of Horace, and other Authors.

1753 T. Francklin Transl. 11 (note) Hammond, author of Love elegies.

1783 H. Blair Lect. Rhetoric I. iv. 69 Sonnets, Pastorals, and Love Elegies.

2003 R. K. Gibson in tr. Ovid Ars Amatoria 378 Domina, the standard term for mistress in love-elegy.

1616—2003(Hide quotations)

1696 J. Lead Fountain of Gardens sig. *F2 The beauteous Love-Eye burning in the Heart; From whence Loves Centres endless multlply.

1775 R. B. Sheridan Rivals iv. iv. 84 Her love-eye was fix'd on me—t'other—her eye of duty, was finely obliqued.

1956 'B. Holiday' & W. Dufty Lady sings Blues xx. 182 I thought this had to be part of a build-up and the love eyes had to come later.

c1540—1956(Hide quotations)

1582 R. Stanyhurst tr. Virgil First Foure Bookes Æneis iv. 78 Or fro this hoat looue fits I shal bee shortlye retrayted [L. vel eo me solvat amantem].

1679 J. Goodman Penitent Pardoned (1713) ii. i. 150 Taken with an agony of mind, or a kind of love-fit.

1713 C. Johnson Successful Pyrate (ed. 2) ii. i. 27 I'll..In this Lethargick Love-Fit steal his Crown.

1859 'H. Lee' Against Wind & Tide (1860) vii. 226 He had discovered one or two mature Phyllises..upon whom he retaliated the luckless experience he had gained in his first love-fit.

1906 Man 6 28 When the love-fit was on between individual males and females.

1582—1906(Hide quotations)

a1626 J. Davies Wks. (1869) I. 470 (title) Love-flight.

1936 Brit. Birds 29 307 The love-flights of many species depend on a subtle change in the character of the wing-beat, most marked perhaps in the waders.

a1626—1936(Hide quotations)

1876 R. Browning Cenciaja 279 The simpleton must ostentatiously Display a ring, the Cardinal's love-gift.

1987 J. Saltman Mod. Canad. Children's Bks. 41 A love-gift from the girl's grandmother—seeds to be planted and to bloom as flowers in the new land.

1590—1987(Hide quotations)

1667 G. Digby Elvira iv. 50 O the unlucky Star That leads a Lady, engaged in love intrigues To take a new Attendant!

1798 W. Render tr. A. von Kotzebue Count Benyowsky iii. 110 Treason! Ships! Love intrigues! Flight! Conspiracy!

1893 H. B. Clarke Spanish Lit. 163 The plot invariably centres round the love intrigue of persons in the middle or upper classes of life.

2002 19th-cent. Lit. 57 196 Valerius immediately befriends Sextus, and as a consequence becomes involved in a love intrigue.

1667—2002(Hide quotations)

1637 S. Rutherford Let. 10 June (1848) clxxv. 328 Any little communion with him [sc. Christ], one of his love-looks, should be my begun heaven.

1680 E. Settle Life & Death Major Clancie vi. 113 They interchange glances of Love-looks, while the Marchant is preparing for his intended visit.

1757 in Amer. Mag. (1758) 86/1 Soft blushes in her cheeks arise And love looks languid in her eyes.

1904 Windsor Mag. June 305/2 Do you think I don't know a love-look when I see it?

1943 M. Lavin Tales from Bective Bridge 36 It was love-talk and love-looks that held down this man.

1637—1943(Hide quotations)

1754 H. Walpole Lett. (1846) III. 64 That living academy of love-lore, my Lady Vane.

1962 Times 7 June 16/3 William Gerhardi speaks of 'love-lore'.

1754—1962(Hide quotations)

1809 (title) Royal love lyrics, from royal love letters, with notes and illustrations.

1856 National Rev. 3 372 The love-lyric..is probably the most intense expression of primitive passion.

1974 P. Dickinson Poison Oracle ii. 44 You get a basic story, but inside it you get dramatic sections and love lyrics.

1809—1974(Hide quotations)

1781 London Mag. Mar. 110/2 Where there is a lasting love Marriage, it would be exceedingly distressing to both of the parties to be convinced that where death does them part, their union is dissolved for ever.

1850 W. M. Thackeray Pendennis II. xxi. 209 Look at your love-marriages... The love-match people are the most notorious of all for quarrelling afterwards.

1990 V. S. Naipaul India: Million Mutinies i. 67 He had a sister who had made a love marriage a year or so before.

1781—1990(Hide quotations)

?1589 T. Nashe Almond for Parrat sig. B Profound Cliffe..broke vp his brotherly loue-meeting abruptly, when the spirite had but newly moued him.

1656 Duchess of Newcastle Natures Pictures x. 346 A procuring Bawd is to make Love-matches, and contrive Love-meetings.

1760 C. Johnstone Chrysal II. xi. 229 I told you that the attempt had been made upon the king, as he was returning from a love-meeting.

1864 A. Daly & F. Wood Taming Butterfly i. 19 A meeting—a love meeting with a woman of fashion! Happy Beaujolais!

1928 D. H. Lawrence Lady Chatterley's Lover xiii. 234 It was not the right sort of heart to take to a love-meeting.

?1589—1928(Hide quotations)

1621 R. Burton Anat. Melancholy iii. i. i. i. 495 Some or other..will much discommend some part of this Treatise of Loue Melancholy.

1694 N. H. Ladies Dict. at Occations of falling in Love Occasion, as we have said, is very much contributing to Love-Melancholy.

1798 C. Lucas Castle of St. Donats xv. 186 They also explained to him..the young Captain's love melancholy.

1832 J. P. Kennedy Swallow Barn I. xxvi. 276 Melancholy,—that is, your love-melancholy,—wears divers antics.

a1963 L. MacNeice Astrol. (1964) v. 162 The astrological causes of love-melancholy.

1621—a1963(Hide quotations)

?a1300 St. Eustace (Digby) l. 111 in C. Horstmann Altengl. Legenden (1881) 2nd Ser. 213 Toward Egipte hy gunnen fare, ffore I-bounden al wiþ kare, And wiþ loue mourninge Of Crist þat alle þinge shop.

1845 Blackwood's Edinb. Mag. May 639/2 He withdraws himself from all feasts, societies, and throngs of men, to dedicate himself to love-mourning.

?a1300—1845(Hide quotations)

1650 A. Cowley Guardian i. iii. sig. A4^v I have two or three Love-odes ready made.

1689 M. Prior Epist. to F. Shephard 50 Pigs might squeak love-odes, dogs bark satire.

1792 S. T. Coleridge Let. 13 Feb. (1956) I. 28 My tiny love ode possesses no other property in the world.

1859 C. M. Bain Poems 142 (title) Rural love ode.

1650—1859(Hide quotations)

1649 R. Baron Apol. for Paris 47 Palme trees are of both sexes, and expresse not a sympathy, but a Love passion.

1753 Dict. Love at Hope It is the hope of that [sc. enjoyment], which is the true basis of the love-passion.

1858 C. Lamb in Harper's Mag. Dec. 79/1 This drowsy Deity, who certainly was first invented in drink, as sloth and luxury are commonly the first movers in these idle love-passions.

1582—1858(Hide quotations)

1640 J. Gough Strange Discov. iv. ii. sig. H4^v O I feare This kindnesse is some love plot on my deare.

1672 J. Dryden Conquest Granada ii. i. ii. 83 But your Love-plot I'le quickly countermine.

1795 tr. Flareau Ocean Spectre iii. ii. 37 Over turn their deep laid love plots by a speedy murther.

1871 D. H. Strother Virginia Illustr. xvi. 298 A story without a love-plot is like a bush without a rose.

1995 Mirror (Nexis) 1 July 8 She will be cheating on her husband Frank all over again in the latest love plot aimed at boosting the show's ratings.

1640—1995(Hide quotations)

1616 G. Chapman in tr. G. Musaeus Divine Poem To Rdr. sig. A8^v It being by all the most Learned, the incomparable Loue-Poem of the world.

1750 Wks. Celebrated Authors 176 I shall not so much as mention his Canticles, which Grotius, as well as I, affirms to be a Love-Poem.

1847 Ld. Tennyson Princess iv. 71 And this A mere love-poem.

1937 D. Thomas Let. 6 Aug. (1987) 255 I'm a long way from everywhere, in a high huge haystack of a studio over the harbour,..writing an occasional bad love poem.

2002 Blush! Nov. 79/2 To get my own back, I sent a love poem to our history teacher and signed it from him.

1616—2002(Hide quotations)

1759 Monthly Rev. 20 179 The Doctor's having entertained himself with translating the whole when he were still younger..were no improper circumstances for the transfusion of a gallant and soft love-poet.

1888 M. Arnold Ess. Crit. 2nd Ser. 43 Nor is Clarinda's love-poet, Sylvander, the real Burns either.

1923 J. M. Murry Pencillings 224 Love poets are seldom the singers of happiness in love.

1995 V. Chandra Red Earth & Pouring Rain (1996) 142 Here we are, you and I, love-poets of the first order, reduced to writing about a homicidal madman.

1759—1995(Hide quotations)

1787 in E. Spenser Poet. Wks. I. p. lxxxix The uncommon ardour of his passion, as well as the fineness of his wit and language, established him the master of love-poetry among the Moderns.

1861 J. Brown Horæ Subsecivæ 2nd Ser. II. 466 This perfervor of our Scottish love poetry.

1991 F. Kanga Heaven on Wheels (1992) vi. 79 And someone gave me a book of Elizabethan love poetry, but you can't read too much of that. Just an occasional dip.

1787—1991(Hide quotations)

1633 W. Prynne Histrio-mastix 88 The Scriptures doe expressly prohibit the personating of any sinne; much more then, the Acting of Adulteries, Incests, Rapes, Murders, Thefts, Lovepranks.

1746 A. Arbuthnot Life Simon, Lord Lovat 204 His Love-pranks began to be the Subject of public-Talk.

1857 G. H. Boker Plays & Poems II. 415 And curl in scorn when other maidens play Their love-pranks round me.

2001 India Today (Nexis) 12 Mar. 73 Many of the traditional Horis retell the love pranks of Krish-na-Radha.

1633—2001(Hide quotations)

1694 L. Echard tr. Plautus Amphitryon iii. ii, in tr. Plautus Comedies 43 Whenever these little Love Quarrels happen, and those made up, the pleasing Passion's doubled.

1715 A. Pope in tr. Homer Iliad I. iii. Observ. 253 There is in one Place a Lover to be protected, in another a Love-Quarrel to be made up.

1798 J. Baillie Introd. Disc. in Series of Plays 56 The clearing up of some mistake or love-quarrel.

1857 C. Dickens Little Dorrit xiii. 111 'One remark,' said Flora, giving their conversation..the tone of a love quarrel.

1993 Callaloo 16 342 How a woman may read her man out, in a love quarrel.

1671—1993(Hide quotations)

1598 W. Shakespeare Love's Labour's Lost iii. i. 176 Dan Cupid, Regent of Loue-rimes.

1601 A. Munday & H. Chettle Death Earle of Huntington sig. E2 These loue-rimes are the tokens of small good.

[ 1737 J. Miller Coffee-house ii. 4 Have a Respect unto the approaching Nuptials of my Friend Sir John Love-rhyme, and the virtuous Lady Toothless.]

1822 S. T. Coleridge Coll. Lett. (1971) V. 218 We used to carry..the pillage of the Flower Gardens..with Sonnet or Love-rhyme wrapped round the Nose-gay.

1905 Mod. Lang. Notes 20 176/1 In this Tuscan folk-poetry Mr. Hewlett finds an artistry which clearly differentiates its from the common love-rhyme of all nations.

1598—1905(Hide quotations)

1603 P. Holland tr. Plutarch Morals 350 The love-secrets [Fr. le secret des amours] and merrie conceits passing from an husband being absent in another countrey, and writing to his wife.

1676 J. Dryden Aureng-Zebe ii. 18 What danger, Arimant, is this you fear? Or what Love-secret which I must not hear?

1753 S. Richardson Hist. Sir Charles Grandison I. xxxvii. 265 And has he, can he have, so many Love-secrets, and yet..not let them transpire to such a sister?

1923 R. Graves Feather Bed 25 This meek ex-novice rifled Of her love-secrets?

1603—1923(Hide quotations)

1561 T. Hoby tr. B. Castiglione Courtyer iii. sig. Bb.ii With what sober mode they shewe fauor to who so is in their loue seruice [It. che gli serue per amore].

1695 J. Lead Laws of Paradise i. 33 When he saw thee wounded..his Eye pitied, and officiated in this Love Service, as one that had a fellow-feeling of thy Calamity.

1863 H. R. Geldart First Steps in Life 238 Such a charming picture she gave of the pleasure and comfort of love service.

1561—1863(Hide quotations)

1656 J. Collop Poesis Rediviva 76 Cupid of thy shoulders makes a bow, From whence fly love shafts wounding.

1692 H. Purcell Fairy-queen ii. 12 Cupid..Let flye his Love-Shaft smartly from his Bow.

1838 Bentley's Misc. 3 544 I have generally observed that a love-shaft pierces through nine hundred and ninety-nine hearts at once.

1993 D. S. Olson Confessions Aubrey Beardsley (1994) x. 199 Andreé..watches from the shade of a garden pavilion, perhaps wishing that the arrows were love-shafts intended for him.

1600—1993(Hide quotations)

1621 R. Burton Anat. Melancholy III. iii. ii. iii. i. 619 Loue will make them Musitians, and to make Ditties, Madrigalls, Elegies, & loue Sonnets.

1796 J. Thelwall Appeal against Kidnapping & Murder 49 Have not our houses been previously plundered by his Majesty's messengers of..manuscripts of all descriptions from the novel and love sonnet to the physiological dissertation?

1870 D. G. Rossetti Let. 26 Feb. (1965) II. 804 The love-sonnets are the preponderant portion.

1958 E. Blunden War Poets 1914–18 ii. 15 In the pre-war poems of Brooke something like a premonition can be seen recurring. A love-sonnet dated 1909 powerfully includes it.

2003 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 10 Apr. 36/2 The popular singer Serafino Aquiliano, a lutenist whose outrageous sendups of Petrarchan love sonnets swept Italy in the 1490s to become the latest fashion in music.

1621—2003(Hide quotations)

?c1225 (▸?a1200) Ancrene Riwle (Cleo. C.vi) (1972) 153 Wið tollinde word oðer wið luue speche.

1588 A. Munday tr. Palmerin D'Oliua i. vi. f. 14 Among a number of soft and sweete loue speeches, he discoursed to her his talke with the Emperour.

1694 N. H. Ladies Dict. at Form of Courtship There are very few even of our Dramatique Writers; whose Love-speeches read well, or appear free or natural.

1796 M. G. Lewis Village Virtues ii. 32 His love-speeches must be extremely moving!

1829 W. M. Thackeray Let. ?25 Feb. (1945) I. 146 A gentleman..arrived [who]..makes love speeches to admiration.

1917 W. B. Yeats Wild Swans at Coole 47 Receive the love-speeches of Juliet with an ironical chirping.

2006 Scotsman 14 Oct. 22 Why else would the producers prompt [him] to give wife Vicky the longest, most inarticulate love speech in TV history?

?c1225—2006(Hide quotations)

a1350 in K. Böddeker Altengl. Dichtungen (1878) 201 Þy loue sprenges tacheþ me.

a1672 P. Sterry Disc. Freedom of Will (1675) iii. 205 In these Angelical Loves, the Seraphims are all forms of things, as in their first, their sweetest created Love-Springs, and Love-Unions.

a1350—a1672(Hide quotations)

a1586 Sir P. Sidney Arcadia (1590) ii. ii. f. 102^v His loue-suits made to Mopsa, meant to Pamela.

1698 R. Gould Satyr against Wooing 6 Some Brawny Groom..Cries Ough, and Mounts, and the Love-suit is done.

1775 R. Cumberland Choleric Man v. iii. 87 I fell into a kind of a love-suit here, with the young lady of this house.

1822 S. T. Coleridge Shorter Wks. & Fragm. (1995) II. 959 His murmur sounded..like the Prologue to a Love-suit.

1943 Mod. Lang. Notes 58 426 One of the most unintelligible lines in Shakespeare occurs in the short speech..in which Diana pretends to accede to Bertram's love-suit.

2001 Signs 27 34 Ladies who refuse the love suit will be held accountable for the lover's inevitable demise.

a1586—2001(Hide quotations)

1728 Congress of Bees 27 I had the Pleasure to hear most dismal love Talk than ever was told in any of our modern Romances.

1862 G. Meredith Mod. Love xxxiii. 65 My wife, read this! Strange love talk, is it not?

1994 R. Hellenga Sixteen Pleasures xiii. 208 Tete-a-tete they talk the love talk they love to talk.

1728—1994(Hide quotations)

1829 Friendship's Offering 245 Her cheek was pale, save when a blush (Raised by the youth's love-theme) cast a flush For a moment o'er it.

1938 R. Graves Coll. Poems p. xxi With the love-theme went the old fear-theme, sharpened rather than blunted by the experiences of peace.

1957 A. R. Manvell & J. Huntley Technique Film Music i. 21 Examples of original music by Griffith and Briel included a prominent love-theme (for the Little Colonel and Elsie Stoneman).

2002 Electronic Gaming Monthly Feb. 148/2 The only reason I felt compelled to go back and play was to hear the cool love theme (and subsequent power ballad) one more time.

1829—2002(Hide quotations)

a1586 Sir P. Sidney Astrophel & Stella (1591) 49 Twinckling starres loue thoughts prouoke.

1688 D. Leeds Temple of Wisdom App. 81 The Spirit of the Life..is as it were more than half mad with Love-thoughts.

1781 H. Downman Poems to Thespia sig. A2 No antique Bards for love-thoughts I explore.

1885 Cent. Mag. July 417/1 He sings the youthful loves of a lass of La Crau,..that touching poem built of love-thoughts and impressions of nature.

1984 ELH 51 711 We have heard Jane fantasize about this kind of allegorical pilgrimage before, though it was significantly after these hitherto undocumented love thoughts.

a1450—1984(Hide quotations)

1566 'W. P.' tr. C. S. Curio Pasquine in Traunce f. 96 Discourses and loue toyes [It. gli amori] are woes, playes and pastimes are woes.

1647 J. Trapp Comm. Epist. & Rev. (Coloss. iv. 16) Other good books must be read..yet not idle pamphlets, and love-toies.

1706 E. Ward Hudibras Redivivus II. ii. 8 Kisses, Love-Toys, and am'rous Prattle.

1773 R. Graves Spiritual Quixote III. ix. xi. 39 One would think it was a love-toy; and that it was given you by your sweet-heart.

2001 FHM Feb. 77/3 The aim is to be your mistress' love-toy and she should employ all means necessary to cajole or punish you into submission.

1566—2001(Hide quotations)

1567 W. Painter Palace of Pleasure II. f. 199 Well it might haue bene said, of loue trickes that she was the only dame and mistresse.

1590 T. Watson Eglogue vpon Death Walsingham 266 Let them suppose sweete Musicke out of vse, and wanton louetricks to be foolish toies.

1729 C. Johnson Village Opera iii. ii. 66 A Love-trick, which is, must, and will always be pardonable.

1826 S. Smith Wks. (1859) II. 90/2 All the various love-tricks of attempting to appear indifferent.

1960 T. Hughes Lupercal 74 Her love-tricks were the grinding of locks.

1567—1960(Hide quotations)

1598 F. Meres tr. Luis de Granada Sinners Guyde i. xix. 202 Hee hath..imployed all the strength and sinnowes of his reason and vnderstanding..in compozing Poems, in making loue Verses [Sp. en componer sonetos llenos de agudeza y sentencias].

1647 A. Cowley (title) The mistresse, or severall copies of love-verses.

a1708 Walsh in J. Dryden Misc. (1727) IV. 335 Petrarch..being by much the most famous of all the Moderns who have written Love-Verses.

1799 F. Reynolds Laugh when you Can i. 4 While I'm copying out pleadings in one room, you're writing love verses in another.

1841 T. D. Lauder Legendary Tales Highlands I. 100 Here is one..which would seem to have a curious posey in it; some ready-made love verse, I suppose.

1927 E. V. Gordon Introd. Old Norse p. xliv Some love-verses of his were there inserted in the poem.

2003 Mod. Lang. Rev. 98 504 Matthew Bell demonstrates from examples of love verse over Goethe's entire career how love is always grounded in nature.

1598—2003(Hide quotations)

1637 S. Rutherford Lett. (1848) cxxiii. 234 Our Lord maketh delicates and dainties of his sweet presence and love-visits to his own.

1735 J. Miller Man of Taste i. i. 7 Besides, Sir, their very Dress and Deportment were shocking. To make a Love-Visit with a plain Leg..and a Coat without Lace.

1898 R. G. Moulton Anc. Classical Drama (ed. 2) viii. 278 If the gods resist,..blockade them when they wish to make their love visits to earth.

1995 J. Jochens Women in Old Norse Society (1998) ii. 34 In recounting the illicit love visits of their pagan ancestors, they recognized the deep historical roots of extramarital sexual relations.

1637—1995(Hide quotations)

a1250 Ureisun ure Louerde (Nero) in R. Morris Old Eng. Homilies (1868) 1st Ser. 201 Hwi ne con ich wowen þe wið swete luue wordes.

a1651 D. Calderwood Hist. Kirk Scotl. (1843) II. 352 Manie love words she useth to Bothwell in this letter.

1883 Longman's Mag. Aug. 368 Why did her love-words echo in his ear?

1999 A. Arensberg Incubus vi. xvi. 184 He used to whisper to her while he aroused her, borrowing love words from classical pornography.

a1250—1999(Hide quotations)

C2. Objective.

1612 A. Stafford tr. I. Lipsius Oration ag. Calumny in Medit. & Resol. 134 I shall desire this faire Audience..to fill and guide the sailes (as I may say) of my Oration, with the Zephyrus, or gentle gale of their loue-breathing thoughts [L. vela hæc, vt sic dicam, orationis meæ Zephyro beniuolentiæ vestræ afflate atque dirigite].

1744 J. Thomson Autumn in Seasons (new ed.) 157 In Rapture warbled from Love-breathing Lips.

1775 R. B. Sheridan Rivals iii. i. 51 What think you of blooming, love-breathing seventeen?

1839 J. A. Hillhouse Dramas I. 22 Love-breathing words, Without direction, date, or name.

1612—1839(Hide quotations)

1606 J. Sylvester tr. G. de S. Du Bartas Deuine Weekes & Wks. (new ed.) ii. iii. 139 Her sweet, love-darting Eyne.

1637 J. Milton Comus 26 Love-darting eyes.

1788 'A. Pasquin' Children of Thespis (ed. 2) iii. 39 See the love-darting blaze of her black rolling eye.

1844 R. F. Williams Secret Passion I. ii. 37 'By those divine and love-darting orbs, I am in no voice,' replied the musician.

1606—1844(Hide quotations)

1594 R. Barnfield Affectionate Shepheard sig. E And thou loue-hating Boy, (whom once I loued) Farewell, a thousand-thousand times farewell.

1962 Educ. Theatre Jrnl. 14 169/2 A son-devouring and love-hating woman who hangs up the stuffed body of her deceased husband in a closet wherever she goes.

2003 Fort Worth (Texas) Star-Telegram (Nexis) 10 Oct. 16 s A love-hating self-help writer, and..a playboy men's-magazine journalist out to expose her softer side.

1594—2003(Hide quotations)

1701 T. D'Urfey Bath ii. i. 13 The Love-inspiring Graces of thy Person.

1797 M. Robinson Walsingham I. 277 The love-inspiring dames of luxurious Italy.

1851 W. M. Thackeray in Scribner's Mag. 2 134/2 The Exhibition..was..a great love-inspiring, gooseflesh-bringing sight.

1934 Soda Springs (Idaho) Sun 4 Oct. 2/2 He's been inviting violence all his life. Not a sweet and love-inspiring chappie.

1999 Scotsman (Nexis) 28 Aug. 10 A roll-call of stories of maddening yet still love-inspiring parents, children and partners.

1701—1999(Hide quotations)

1532 T. More Confut. Tyndale in Wks. 403/1 His false loue-lacking charitie.

1532—1593(Hide quotations)

1742 A. Pope New Dunciad 298 Love-whisp'ring woods, and Lute-resounding waves.

a1790 W. Livingston Philos. Solitude in Landmark Anthol. (1793) 155 Love-whispering groves, and silver-streaming floods.

1742—a1790(Hide quotations)

1591 J. Lyly Endimion i. iii. sig. B4 Thys idle humor of loue..tickleth not my lyuer, from whence the Loue-mongers in former age seemed to inferre they should proceede.

1772 J. Entick New Spelling Dict. (new ed.) Lovemonger , s. one who deals in affairs of love.

1865 A. C. Swinburne Chastelard i. ii. 35 These jangling song-smiths are keen love-mongers, They snap at all meats.

1962 Winnipeg (Manitoba) Free Press 13 Mar. 9/4 She is natural prey to the..cynically patient love-mongers that exist in the shadows of a corrupt society.

2001 Grand Rapids (Mich.) Press (Nexis) 27 Sept. a22 The love mongers, who preach endlessly about loving everything and love as a way of salvation are really not talking about love.

1591—2001(Hide quotations)

C3. Adverbial (chiefly instrumental), parasynthetic, and similative.

1668 T. Jordan Money is Asse v. i. 40 Our Parents did..propagate the world, with love born Creatures.

1754 G. Jeffreys Misc. 33 Wrong'd by Love-born Jealousy, She fled.

1838 E. S. Wortley Lays of Leisure Hours II. 472 Often have I..deemed Life's happiest moments were Ev'n those that owned no love-born care.

1668—1838(Hide quotations)

1787 F. Grose Superstitions 3 in Provinc. Gloss. But if any disconsolate old maiden, or love-crossed bachelor, happened to dispatch themselves in their garters, the room where the deed was perpetrated was rendered forever uninhabitable.

1885 R. Bridges Eros & Psyche viii. iv. 93 Many an old love-crossed And doleful ditty would she gently sing.

1963 F. L. Lucas Drama of Chekhov, Synge, Yeats, & Pirandello i. 14 He was thinking early in 1901 of a play about a love-crossed scientist going on an expedition to the Arctic.

2004 Gloucs. Citizen (Nexis) 15 July 1 People will be able to see the Bard at his best with love-crossed nobles, mischievous servants and fools and jesters galore.

1787—2004(Hide quotations)

1832 Ld. Tennyson Eleänore in Poems (new ed.) 29 The languors of thy lovedeep eyes.

1988 N. C. L. Madgett Octavia ii. 83 Even in this world may the love-deep roots of trees conquer evil's senseless blight.

1832—1988(Hide quotations)

1725 E. Fenton in A. Pope et al. tr. Homer Odyssey I. i. 532 Love-dittied airs [Gk. ἱμερόεσσαν ἀοιδὴν], and dance, conclude the day.

1835 R. Mant British Months 194 Thou..Dost sweetly with love-dittied song Help the slow-pacing hours along.

1725—1835(Hide quotations)

a1791 T. Blacklock Poems (1793) 168 Let her fly The tender lisp, the love-illumin'd eye.

1910 E. M. Barton Litany 72 Youths and maidens, now so hopefully surveying The love-illumined avenue of life.

a1791—1910(Hide quotations)

1691 E. Taylor in tr. J. Behmen Theosoph. Philos. 204 No Tongue or Pen can more than smatter, at the recital of the love-inspired Words.

1754 T. Cooke Hymn to May 8 Now the love-inspired Swain Breathes his Vows.

1877 P. J. Bailey Festus (ed. 10) xviii. 273 To assimilate to his own, All spirits, that, love-inspired, they share his boundless throne.

1942 Philos. & Phenomenol. Res. 2 285 He is attracted by the love inspired and selfless proselytism of St. Francis.

2005 Leamington Spa Courier (Nexis) 26 Sept. The New Year brings Vivaldi concertos and Bach sonatas with more Quartets and Valentines's Day love-inspired music.

1691—2005(Hide quotations)

a1586 Sir P. Sidney Arcadia (1593) i. sig. H5 Then did he slack his loue-enstructed pace.

1882 W. Carleton Farm Ballads (rev. ed.) 121 Leaves picked by love-instructed art From off the branches of the heart.

a1586—1882(Hide quotations)

1696 J. Lead Fountain of Gardens sig. *E3^v Let all the Heavenly Nine..in one high Love-labour'd Song agree.

1757 W. Thompson Gondibert & Birtha in Poems on Several Occasions i. iii. 339 The Love-labour'd Song of Nightingales.

1867 A. Cary Bishop's Son xi. 200 The night warbling bird, that now awake, Tunes sweetest his love-labored song.

1667—1867(Hide quotations)

1772 S. Whyte Shamrock 20 A chearless Guest, Yok'd with Despair, in a Love-laden Breast.

1820 P. B. Shelley To Skylark in Prometheus Unbound 203 Soothing her love-laden Soul in secret hour With music sweet as love.

1908 New Reformer July 119 The British Conquest of India freed three millions of the population to enjoy the love-laden atmosphere of Christianity.

1772—1908(Hide quotations)

1785 T. Dwight Conquest of Canäan iii. 64 For earth too bright were these love-lighted fires!

1904 Daily Chron. 9 Feb. 5/2 Peering through the pale miracle of spring at his violets,..his blear eyes love-lighted.

1785—1904(Hide quotations)

a1809 A. Seward Poet. Wks. (1810) III. 63 Long shall thy love-lit eyes be dim If soon thou art not bravely free.

1948 E. Blunden Shakespeare to Hardy (1964) 208 Here she is in her father's garden, flowering, love-lit, awaiting the slow old Nurse.

a1809—1948(Hide quotations)

a1586 Sir P. Sidney Arcadia (1593) i. sig. H5^v His loue-open eye..that eu'n did marke hir troden grasse.

a1586—a1586(Hide quotations)

1717 E. Fenton tr. Homer Odyssey xi, in Poems 101 Wand'ring Love-pensive near his Amber Stream.

1770 J. Armstrong Forced Marriage i. ii, in Misc. II. 79 A hopeful youth to grow love-pensive!

1717—1770(Hide quotations)

1749 S. Richardson Clarissa (ed. 2) III. lxxvi. 363 For already I am convinced, that there is not a woman in the world that is Love-proof and Plot-proof, if she be not the person.

1810 Splendid Follies III. 121 The widow..placed herself opposite this love-proof hero.

1888 N. F. Davin Eos 26 Cold, love proof maid, serene, omnipotent In arms.

1941 T. R. Ybarra Young Man of Caracas i. 9 Despite her conquests, Minnie Russell remained love-proof.

2002 Times (Nexis) 27 Apr. He..is suddenly stuck with a very uncool child (Hoult), who starts invading every corner of his love-proof life.

1749—2002(Hide quotations)

1833 A. Domett Poems 174 Those eyes, whose language did surpass The eye-talk of love-smitten lass.

1996 A. Lykiard tr. L. Aragon Irene's Cunt 64 Let your two motionless palms, your love-smitten mitts on that prominent curve, join up towards the hardest, best point which raises the holy ogive to its peak.

1833—1996(Hide quotations)

1648 R. Herrick Hesperides sig. I4^v The love-spent Youth, and love-sick Maid.

1654 T. White Contempl. of Heaven ii. 132 The most charming Mystery, and inchanting Riddle, that ever love-spent bowels were able to sing or sigh out.

1648—1654(Hide quotations)

1880 M. H. De la Cherois-Crommelin Black Abbey III. 322 At first, poor love-starved Nannie listened with avidity.

1909 Westm. Gaz. 24 July 2/1 Love-starved young Keats hath cast his gift of clay.

1996 Company Dec. 42/1 The latest trend in love-starved Hollywood, a town where you can't move for gorgeous lovelies, arm in arm with dweebs.

1880—1996(Hide quotations)

1750 H. Snell Female Soldier 132 Our Hannah pretended to be love-stricken, at the very first Sight.

1806 T. S. Surr Winter in London II. x. 235 Bless me, the youth is love-stricken!

1992 New Yorker 24 Aug. 80/3 Willis has a fine-beaten air as a love-stricken schlub.

1750—1992(Hide quotations)

1831 L. E. Landon Improvisatrice 61 Those winged words of soul and flame, Breathed in the dark-eyed beauty's ear By some young love-touched cavalier.

1872 A. T. de Vere Arraignment in Legends St. Patrick 7 Like birds that cannot stay their songs Love-touched in Spring.

1831—1872(Hide quotations)

1587 G. Turberville Tragicall Tales 198 Where the blinded archer with his bow Did glaunce at sundry gallants euery day..Yet must I seeme loue wounded eke to be.

1905 A. C. Swinburne Poems II. 109 A heart love-wounded whereto love was law.

1587—1905(Hide quotations)

1856 W. Whitman Leaves of Grass (new ed.) 172 Hair, bosom, hips, bend of legs,..love-flesh swelling and deliciously aching.

c1890 My Secret Life IX. i How soft and smooth,..solid, stiff, yet semi-elastic is the male love truncheon.

1896 J. S. Farmer & W. E. Henley Slang IV. 241/2 Love-lane,..the female pudendum.

c1930 Confessions of Virtuous Wife 65 I so tickled the little button just at the entrance of her love grotto, that she hugged me convulsively to her bosom.

1962 P. Crump Burn, Killer, Burn xlii. 386 Ya make me nervous with that death talk and my love bone goes down.

1990 Maledicta 1988–9 10 52 Terms of endearment for women's breasts,..love pillows.

2006 Sydney Morning Herald (Nexis) 30 Nov. (Essential section) 8 Leading men often leap for the love button without any attempt at foreplay.

1856—2006(Hide quotations)

1833 [see love game n. at Compounds 6].

1878 J. Marshall Ann. Tennis 158 Love-set, a set in which one player wins six consecutive games; or, in case of an advantage-set, seven consecutive games.

1884 Pall Mall Gaz. 25 Apr. 3/2 In the two first days' play the whole of the heats were love victories.

1930 Southtown Economist (Chicago) 8 Aug. 5/4 To the player winning the most love sets in proportion to the number of matches played, will be presented a racket press.

2003 O. Shine Lang. Tennis 75 A love match, these days, would be unheard of, but at a Seattle tournament in 1910 Hazel Hotchkiss won 48 straight points to beat a Miss Huiskamp 6–0, 6–0 without losing a point.

1833—2003(Hide quotations)

C6.

?c1225 (▸?a1200) Ancrene Riwle (Cleo. C.vi) (1972) 315 Ma of liðe wordes þenne of sturne, for þer of kimeð þinge best. þet is luue eie.

?c1225—a1500(Hide quotations)

1967 Fresno (Calif.) Bee 23 Aug. a3/7 Hippy bag... Holds everything. Love beads, books..you name it.

1968 Daily Colonist (Victoria, Brit. Columbia) 20 June 1/5 Love beads draped on him by Pierre Trudeau, adorn former Prime Minister Pearson at Toronto political rally.

1969 R. Lowell Notebk. 1967–8 (1970) 217 Our love-beads Rattling together to show that we were young.

1973 'B. Mather' Snowline xiii. 155 Weirdo fringed shirts, headbands, love beads..as unsavoury a bunch of love children as I have ever seen.

2003 D. Gaines Misfit's Manifesto xv. 328 There had been long-standing rumors of Johnny all douched up in the '60s with love beads, a headband, and bell-bottoms, but I said nothing.

1928—2003(Hide quotations)

1761 T. Smollett Sir Launcelot Greaves in Brit. Mag. Dec. 631/1 He owned she was a love-begotten babe.

1771 T. Smollett Humphry Clinker I. 172 That he had been a love-begotten babe, brought up in the work-house.

1843 J. S. Knowles Secretary v. iv, in Dramatic Wks. (1859) 454 He was of noble stock, and told you true—My eldest brother's love-begotten son!

1761—1843(Hide quotations)

1749 J. Cleland Mem. Woman of Pleasure II. 63 Then the turtle-billing kisses, and the poignant painless love-bites.

1778 tr. J. Lernutius in tr. J. Secundus Kisses (ed. 3) x. 108 (note) Poignant Love-Bites, and the nimble Tongue, Shall the dear Wanderer recal.

1903 H. Ellis Stud. Psychol. Sex III. 71 We may find references to love-bites in the literature of ancient as well as of modern times... In the Indian Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana a chapter is devoted to this subject.

1972 Daily Tel. 29 Jan. 3/1 Once I saw her sitting in class with a love bite on her neck.

2004 J. Meno Hairstyles of Damned 142 She had this love bite, you know, on her neck; one bright red mark at the base of her throat.

1749—2004(Hide quotations)

?1507 W. Dunbar Tua Mariit Wemen (Rouen) in Poems (1998) I. 47 I cast on him a crabit e..And lettis it is a luf blenk.

1636 S. Rutherford Lett. (1863) I. 155 My Bridegroom's love-blinks fatten my weary soul.

1716 J. Willison Treat. conc. Sanctifying Lord's Day 261 Can you say there is nothing..would please you so much as one Ray or Love-blink of his [sc. Christ's] Countenance?

1823 R. Story In my Hey-day of Youth in Poet. Wks. (1857) 35 If there's gloom in her e'e..It stays na sae lang till it quite disappears, Laughed aff by a love-blink.

1927 J. Carruthers Man Beset i. §3 'I canna thole women.'.. James laughed... 'Wait till ane o' them gies ye the love-blink.'

?1507—1927(Hide quotations)

?c1225 (▸?a1200) Ancrene Riwle (Cleo. C.vi) (1972) 82 As mi leofmon seið to me in þet luue boke, 'osculetur me osculo oris sui'.

1587 F. Clement Petie Schole sig. Cij^v Bookeloue I say, but I meane not louebookes, which..be the enemies of vertue.

1690 T. Shadwell Amorous Bigotte i. i. 2 What's here? a wicked and profane Love Book.

1845 N. P. Willis Dashes at Life with Free Pencil ii. 64 He has written Henrietta Temple—the silliest yet truest love-book of modern time.

1936 C. S. Lewis Allegory of Love iv. 172 Hence those strange comings and goings in every medieval love-book.

2003 SubStance 32 29 It is a love book, but the torturers ascribe a different value to it and don't understand it.

?c1225—2003(Hide quotations)

1655 R. Davenport King Iohn & Matilda v. sig. H2 The wound that foolish love-Boy there..Had struck your heart with.

a1656 J. Ussher Ann. World (1658) vi. 131 Pausanias, being discovered by Argilius, his love-boy.

1914 C. Mackenzie Sinister St. II. iv. iv. 930 Good job if that love-boy of hers does punch into her. Silly cow! She ought to know better.

1993 J. Peck Argura 61 He turns away to returning love-boy, she returns to father.

1655—1993(Hide quotations)

a1700 in R. Nares Gloss. (1822) Four love brats will be laid to thee.

1998 Herald (Glasgow) (Nexis) 12 May 28 Your own zany brand of humour..is surely the cheeky love brat of Howard Stern and Jenny Eclair.

a1700—1998(Hide quotations)

a1616 W. Shakespeare Twelfth Night (1623) iii. ii. 34 There is no loue-Broker in the world, can more preuaile in mans commendation with woman, then report of valour.View more context for this quotation

1698 E. Settle Farther Def. Dramatick Poetry 16 Our Diminitive Love-broker has no more Hand in the Affair, then meer starting the Game.

1885 Times 8 May 11/4 She reveals herself as a love-broker, a weekly lender of love.

1988 Toronto Star (Nexis) 30 May c4 (headline) Movie casting directors really love brokers... At least six of their [on-screen] pairings have developed into real-life romances.

2007 San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News (Nexis) 20 June h3 That 21st-century dating experience led Koechel to seek out a practitioner of an ages-old custom: matchmaking... These love brokers reflect modern life.

a1616—2007(Hide quotations)

1600 Englands Helicon sig. I4 (title) Phillidaes Loue-call to her Coridon, and his replying.

1824 M. R. Mitford Our Village I. 198 In less than two minutes Harriet heard the love-call sounded at Sally's gate.

1880 A. H. Swinton Insect Variety v. 209 A love-call that reproduces..the strutting, wing-drumming, and rustling of the males of the turkey and grouse at the pairing time.

1887 Athenæum 31 Dec. 901/3 He [sc. Mr. Rowbotham] disagrees with Darwin in finding the origin of all instrumental music in the love-call.

1934 J. A. Thomson & E. J. Holmyard Biol. for Everyman I. xx. 645 Partly a challenge..it is also a love-call; and the male bird has a simple courtship ritual of strutting before his desired mate.

2002 New Scientist 15 June 32/1 In Panama, predatory bats home in on the night-time love calls of male tungara frogs.

1600—2002(Hide quotations)

1601 tr. M. Martínez 9th Pt. Mirrour of Knight-hood sig. Hh2^v The great and famous Captaine Bembo rose up, who in Loue causes [Sp. en casos de amor] desired euer to bee the first.

1668 P. M. Cimmerian Matron 11 in W. Charleton Ephesian & Cimmerian Matrons Her Clients were often forced to gratifie her, for solliciting their Love-causes, with such Fees.

1798 A. Schink tr. A. von Kotzebue Stranger iv. i. 46 You must..plead my Love-cause with Mrs. Smith.

1824 C. M. Sedgwick Redwood III. xx. 130 Depend on it, a love cause is better in the hands of the principal than the most eloquent agent.

1601—1824(Hide quotations)

1948 Waukesha (Winsconsin) Daily Freeman 26 Feb. 10/3 The reader who fights for each installment of high adventure, mass homicide, glamor and love comics is an 'ego enhancement' type.

1951 M. McLuhan Mech. Bride 151/2 It recently shifted a large section of its enterprises from murder to love comics.

1970 G. Greer Female Eunuch 214 The market is contested by..love comics and fotoromance.

1992 S. Tharoor Show Business (1995) v. 254 The house is already littered with cassette tapes, love comics, costume jewelry, and pinup posters.

1948—1992(Hide quotations)

1561 J. Daus tr. H. Bullinger Hundred Serm. vpon Apocalips xlii. 280 Poysoning, louecuppes, and inchauntmentes [L. venena, philtra & incantationes], were in the time of S. Iohn most frequented, through out the Romane Empire.

1792 E. Sibly New & Compl. Illustr. Occult Sci. (new ed.) iv. 1111 As for philtres, love-cups, and the like, they unquestionably proceed from a natural cause.

1891 A. Austin Human Trag. iii. 162 Then shall no love-cup cheat the toils that tire Nor care be chased by wedlock's staunch caress.

1925 E. H. Haight Horace & Art of Enjoym. 204 In reply to his piteous appeal Canidia only invokes Night and Diana to aid her in preparing a more potent love cup for the man who scorns her.

2000 Sentinel (Stoke-on-Trent) (Nexis) 25 Apr. Mead and fruit wine were served in Tudor three-handled 'love-cups'.

1561—2000(Hide quotations)

1840 Burton's Gentleman's Mag. Feb. 69 An aggravator, or love curl, of a delicate roundness, hung low upon the imperial forehead.

1926 T. E. Lawrence Seven Pillars (subscribers' ed.) lxxxvii. 461 In command was young Metaab, stripped to his skimp riding-drawers for hard work, with his black love-curls awry.

1971 Sun (Lowell, Mass.) 9 Sept. 21/2 The 'Love Touch' is a casual cap of a coiffure highlighted by love curls, braids or waves.

1840—1971(Hide quotations)

1761 Petition P. Yeaman in Sessions Papers 28 July 13 That he and others went [to clean the mill-leads], and some did not; which made the deponent believe it was a love-dargue.

1895 'I. Maclaren' Days Auld Lang Syne 338 It's a love-darg,..because ye've been sober..they juist want to show kindness, bein' oor neeburs.

1960 Huntly Express 27 May in Sc. National Dict. (1965) VI. 166/1 Mr Smith seems to have been a popular type and instead of offering him a present or standing him a complimentary dinner, the farmers decided to treat him to a love darg.

1761—1960(Hide quotations)

1877 F. P. Pascoe Zool. Classif. 122 A curious organ is a pyriform muscular sac, containing one or two slender conical styles, which can be thrust out through the aperture of the sac; they are found in certain snails, and with them they pierce each other's skin. They are known as 'love-darts'.

1958 J. E. Morton Molluscs vii. 132 The vagina develops also a muscular caecum, the dart sac, in which is produced a fine-pointed calcareous shaft, about 5/16in. long, and delicately ridged. This is the telum amoris, or 'love dart', which is exchanged by the partners with some velocity before courtship.

2005 Trends in Ecol. & Evol. 20 582/2 The use of the love dart (laced with hormones from the dart sac-associated mucus glands) increases the number of escaping spermatozoa.

1877—2005(Hide quotations)

c1390 (▸?a1325) Long Charter of Christ (Vernon) A. l. 62 in F. J. Furnivall Minor Poems Vernon MS (1901) ii. 642 (MED) And þis I made for Monkynde, Mi loue-dedes to haue in mynde.

a1631 J. Donne Poems (1633) 223 Gentle love-deeds, as blossomes on a bough, From loves awakened root do bud out now.

1846 J. Keble Lyra Innocentium (1862) 58 So many love-deeds done, to cease Her kindly toil..Small joy to her would seem.

1891 T. D. Sullivan tr. Ailleen & Baille in Blanaid & Other Poems 98 The saddest, sweetest love deeds done In Ulster's noble land.

1911 E. Toldridge Mother's Love Songs in William & Mary Q. 19 296 Love-words, love-deeds, and tenderer, too, Than we give to any other.

c1390—1911(Hide quotations)

1647 R. Stapleton tr. Juvenal Sixteen Satyrs 85 Their love-draughts, charmes, and druggs [L. hippomanes carmenque..coctumque uenenum].

1751 J. Stirling tr. Horace Wks. I. v. v. 159/2 Dry'd liver might be a love draught [L. amoris poculum].

1841 G. Borrow Zincali I. ii. i. 228 The women..dealing in love draughts and diablerie.

1906 Westm. Gaz. 27 Aug. 3/1 The love-draught which Tristram and Iseult drink together.

2002 Herald (Glasgow) (Nexis) 13 July 5 We talked on into the night about the morality of love draughts.

1647—2002(Hide quotations)

a1400 Ancrene Riwle (Pepys) (1976) 159 Haue swich drede to hym as þe good wyf haþ to hir housbonde, þat is, a loue drede for loue þat sche haþ to hym.

a1425 J. Wyclif Sel. Eng. Wks. (1871) II. 316 Love-drede is in men wiþouten siche servile drede.

c1450 Jacob's Well (1900) 243 For þe loue-dreed þat sche hadde to god.

1641 W. Vaughan Sovles Exercise v. 181 He must take up the Crosse with Love-dread Note.

a1400—1641(Hide quotations)

1613 J. Marston & W. Barksted Insatiate Countesse v. sig. I4^v Let him that hath drunke loue drugs trust a woman.

1876 J. B. L. Warren Soldier of Fortune iv. iv. 358 He would rub the love-drug from his eyes.

1954 Rev. Eng. Stud. 5 270 'Budded bosom-peaks' seems to me too hackneyed..an indelicacy to come from Tennyson, even though he gives it to the mouth of Lucretius mad with a love-drug.

1969 Rolling Stone 17 May 3/4 The new 'love drug', MDA (3, 4-methylenedioxy-phenyl-iso-propylamine).

2002 Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 22 Apr. 5/8 A love drug that claims to trigger erections more quickly and safely than Viagra is expected to reach the Australian market next year.

1613—2002(Hide quotations)

1907 Oakland (Calif.) Tribune 6 Oct. (Sporting section) 9/3 After the fight was over the St. Louis papers referred to the affair as a kid glove love fest.

1950 F. Howley Berlin Command vi. 109 I grew skeptical about having a love fest after such a battle.

2006 Sunday Times (Nexis) 12 Mar. 15 Keating's extended chat with the writer..was an unexpurgated love-fest.

1907—2006(Hide quotations)

1637 S. Rutherford Let. 7 Mar. in Joshua Redivivus (1664) ci. 201 I dare beleeve no evil of Christ: if he would cool my love-fever for himself with reall presence & possession, I would be rich.

1753 S. Richardson Hist. Sir Charles Grandison I. 88 But when the Love-fever was at the height, did you make any-body uneasy with your passion?

1868 M. Collins Sweet Anne Page III. 105 The love-fever has variable symptoms.

1952 Ann. Amer. Acad. Polit. & Social Sci. 279 214/2 Weinstein argues effectively for love as the product of responsible family living and sanely deplores the love fever brand of romanticism.

2005 Barrie (Ont.) Examiner (Nexis) 2 May a8 Being romantic is terrific once you're in a relationship, but not if you work yourself into a love fever before you've even heard a Yes to a first date.

1637—2005(Hide quotations)

a1375 (▸c1350) William of Palerne (1867) l. 1020 (MED) William wold fonde for to pleie in þat place þe priue loue game.

1591 Troublesome Raigne Iohn sig. D2^v Is all the bloud yspilt on either part..Growne to a loue-game and a Bridall feast?

1819 Metropolis (ed. 2) I. 133 It may be an useful lesson to yourself and to others who play the love-game at piquet.

1833 T. Hook Parson's Daughter I. vi. 106 Can't make a hazard..and has lost two love games.

1897 Earl of Suffolk et al. Encycl. Sport I. 264/2 (Curling) Souter, to score a love game; not to allow the opponents to score.

1925 F. Harris My Life & Loves I. 182 I waited a little while and then began the love game.

1978 Detroit Free Press 5 Mar. c2/1 Connors..quickly served a love game to tie the score.

1985 I. Opie & P. Opie Singing Game iv. 126 'Now you're married we wish you joy' is, of course, tagged on to many a love game.

2003 O. Shine Lang. Tennis 80 An exchange of love games moved the set into a tie-break.

a1375—2003(Hide quotations)

1987 TV Guide 7 Nov. 6/2 Their standards and practices permitted the words 'prophylactic' and 'contraceptive' and even a student who calls a condom a 'love glove'.

2005 L. Sussman Happy, Healthy & Sexy vi. 140 Remember your three Ls—lube (lots of it, the water-based kind), love glove and logic.

1975—2005(Hide quotations)

1598 G. Chapman in C. Marlowe & G. Chapman Hero & Leander (new ed.) iii. sig. F^v The treasure which the Loue-god let him ioy In his deare Hero.

1887 C. Bowen tr. Virgil Æneid i, in tr. Virgil in Eng. Verse 101 She addresses the Love-god plumed for the flight.

1961 W. Brandon Indians 113/2 The Pan of the later Pueblos, a humpbacked ithyphallic love god usually shown leeringly playing a seductive flute.

1982 Washington Post (Nexis) 19 Nov. (Weekend section) 19 James Dean, her safely dead love god.

2002 Loaded July (Encycl. Eroticus Suppl.) 4/1 Best position for aquatic fun. Deep penetration coupled with the steam should assure your status as a love god.

1598—2002(Hide quotations)

1837 T. Carlyle French Revol. II. i. xii. 89 Beauty no longer swims decorated in her garniture, like Love-goddess hidden-revealed in her Paphian clouds.

1949 Mansfield (Ohio) News-Jrnl. 2 Jan. 7/7 Worshipped by the throng that has always revered cleavage above dramatic ability, Rita became what Life magazine termed the love goddess of the twentieth century.

1995 Vanity Fair (N.Y.) Sept. 226/2 The love-goddess contours of her body.

2001 Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc. 145 458 Aphrodite, the love-goddess,..bears a strong resemblance to the Semitic love-goddess Ishtar.

1837—2001(Hide quotations)

1970 Current Slang (Univ. S. Dakota) 4 iii.–iv. 20 Love handles , the fat on one's sides.

1989 T. Clancy Clear & Present Danger xiii. 306 No longer a young man.., love handles at his waist, much of his hair gone.

2005 Cosmopolitan Aug. 141/4 My girlfriend had a tummy tuck to get rid of her belly... She says it was worth it, but I'd rather have her love handles.

1970—2005(Hide quotations)

1925 J. Riviere et al. tr. S. Freud Coll. Papers IV. 79 So the second antithesis, love-hate, reproduces the polarity pleasure-pain, which is bound up with the former.

1937 H. Nicolson Diary 16 June (1966) 302 Goering..has the love-hate complex of the average German bourgeois for England.

1950 E. J. Simmons Dostoevsky xix. 315 Versilov's..love-hate relations with Katerina which conclude with his mad attempt to murder her.

1972 Ld. Robens Ten Year Stint ii. 15 My personal relationship with the men and their leaders was schizophrenic—a sort of love-hate relationship.

2002 M. Holroyd Wks. on Paper 308 Television..has become the chief vehicle for a love-hate obsession with 'personalities'.

1925—2002(Hide quotations)

1967 A. Wilson No Laughing Matter ii. 216 She love-hates him enough to be unable to leave him.

1985 N.Y. Times (Nexis) 20 Jan. iii. 1 Places in the city that are visited, pointed out, love-hated and pondered.

2002 A. N. Wilson Victorians xxii. 339 The boozy old boilers, the Mrs Gamps and Betsy Prigs whom Dickens love-hated, stayed away.

1963—2002(Hide quotations)

1928 Ogden Standard-Examiner (Ogden City, Utah) 5 Aug. 4/1 Coupled to this love-hatred feature of the Smith situation, there is the great American admiration for the personality and career of Herbert Hoover.

1951 H. Hatfield Thomas Mann iii. 36 The protagonists in Two Friends, a novella of the love-hatred between a responsible burgher and a ne'er-do-well, afford a certain parallel to Thomas and Christian Buddenbrook.

1961 Times 18 Mar. 11/4 The love-hatred of Isolde for Tristan.

2002 Evening Standard (Nexis) 12 May (ES Mag.) 3 London born and bred, I share the love-hatred for my city of most Londoners.

1928—2002(Hide quotations)

1649 J. Ellistone tr. J. Böhme Epist. xvii. viii. 140 I onely sought the pleasant love heart of Jesus Christ [Ger. das liebreiche Hertz Jesu Christi] to hide my selfe therein.

1907 Galveston (Texas) Daily News 8 Sept. 20/2 Above the altar hung two banded hearts of blue and white forget-me-nots, from which depended by streamers and love hearts of tulle a floral wedding belle of white tuberoses.

1990 Pink Paper 10 Feb. 5/4 Love Consultants will erect a giant loveheart sign outside the house of the admiree.

2002 R. Watson in A. Cattanach Story so Far iv. 95 She always drew love hearts.

1649—2002(Hide quotations)

1650 L. Lawrence Epithalamium 6 Night in her Love-hood..Enters (the friendly crowd) attyr'd in Jet.

1663 R. Boyle Exper. & Consid. Colours (1664) 198 Such a kind of Transparency, as that of a Sive, a piece of Cyprus, or a Love-Hood.

1747 M. Delany Autobiogr. & Corr. (1861) II. 478 I shall make no more dark things; after three months black silk is worn with love hood.

1861 Times 19 Mar. 5/5 The ladies to wear black silk, plain muslin or long lawn, crepe or love hoods.

1893 B. Tuckerman P. Stuyvesant 151 The scarlet petticoat was to go to Gertruyd, the black love-hood to Annetje.

1650—1893(Hide quotations)

1778 A. Ferguson Let. 7 Feb. in H. Mackenzie Life J. Home 117 I can conceive that the substitution of a love-interest for an interest of state, which the audience expected from the name of Alfred, may have baulked them.

1868 Times 25 Sept. 7/3 The statement that Richardson has created the love interest of modern novels is only true in the sense that Richardson created the modern novel.

1892 H. James Notebks. (1947) 129 There must be a 'love-interest'—which is one and the same with the other parts of the situation.

1938 R. G. Collingwood Princ. Art v. 84 The cinema, where it is said to be a principle accepted by almost every manager that no film can succeed without a love-interest.

1961 C. S. Lewis Exper. in Crit. iv. 38 The story of excitement or mystery usually has a 'love interest' tacked on to it.

1990 Star-Ledger (Newark, New Jersey) 28 Oct. iv. 7/3 She usually plays 'the love interest'. But she hopes that will change as movies take a feminine tilt.

2004 Times Lit. Suppl. 4 June 18/1 The love interest, needless to say, was not with Briseis, but with Patroclus.

1778—2004(Hide quotations)

1586 W. Webbe Disc. Eng. Poetrie sig. Iiiii The Cornation that among the loue laddes wontes to be worne much.

1632 J. Vicars tr. Virgil XII Aeneids i. 24 This love-lad [sc. Cupid] straight his mothers minde obeyes.

1907 Academy 19 Oct. 29/1 All along the willow-way My love-lad lies sleeping [i.e. dead].

1586—1907(Hide quotations)

1594 R. Barnfield Affectionate Shepheard sig. Giii^v Helen, Maenelaus louing, lou'd, louelie, a loue-lasse, Till spight full Fortune from a loue-lasse made her a loue-lesse Wife.

1610 R. Niccols England's Eliza in Mirour for Magistrates (new ed.) Induct. 776 So soone as Tython's love-lasse gan display Her opall colours in her Easterne throne.

1594—1610(Hide quotations)

?c1225 (▸?a1200) Ancrene Riwle (Cleo. C.vi) (1972) 73 His echȝe aa bi hald þe ȝef þu makest..ani luuelates towart unðeawes.

a1400 Ancrene Riwle (Pepys) (1976) 38 Ȝiue me þi louelates, ȝe, to me and to non oþer.

?c1225—a1400(Hide quotations)

1602 T. Dekker Satiro-mastix sig. E4^v Sir Vau. I desire you to..read this Paper... Mini. Ile receiue no Loue libels perdy, but by word a mouth.

1602—1602(Hide quotations)

1855 Putnam's Monthly Mag. Dec. 657/2 The love-life of Weatherford, his dauntless gallantry, his marvelous personal adventures and hair-breadth escapes, and chief of all, his wonderful eloquence.

1919 M. K. Bradby Psycho-anal. v. 59 The character and development of the infantile love for father and mother will have an influence on the whole love-life of later years.

1934 'R. West' Mod. Rake's Progress 74 Ecclesiastics..called out to sanctify the love-life of our puny little George.

1959 A. Christie Cat among Pigeons viii. 89 Even Games Mistresses may have their love lives.

1972 T. Ardies This Suitcase xiii. 140 He's the guy who's trying to break up my love life.

2004 New Woman May 70/4 After she successfully sorts out her boss's love life, she becomes a love trainer and puts her all into sussing other people's relationships.

1855—2004(Hide quotations)

1833 H. Coleridge She is not Fair (song) 10 I cease not to behold The love-light in her eye.

1852 P. J. Bailey Festus (ed. 5) 189 Her bright heart With lovelight glowed.

1907 Westm. Gaz. 17 May 2/3 In your dew-bright eyes,..Love-light shone beaming.

1950 N. Coward Sail Away in B. Day N. Coward: Compl. Lyrics (1998) 263/2 When the love-light is fading in your sweetheart's eye, Sail away—sail away.

1988 New Idea (Melbourne) 19 Mar. 4/1 Kylie: is that a lovelight in her eyes?

1833—1988(Hide quotations)

c1390 in C. Brown Relig. Lyrics 14th Cent. (1924) 178 Þat is Marie, Moder fre..A loue-likyng is come to me To serue þat ladi.

▸ a1398 J. Trevisa tr. Bartholomaeus Anglicus De Proprietatibus Rerum (BL Add.) f. 259 In alle bestes is appetit of loue lykynge.

c1405 (▸c1390) G. Chaucer Sir Thopas (Hengwrt) l. 138 Of romances that been reales Of Popes and of Cardynales And eek of loue-liking.

1579 T. North tr. Plutarch Liues 1116 Sometimes she [sc. Poppaea] woulde shut her dore against Nero..bicause she woulde keepe Nero in breath, and in loue liking still.

a1662 H. Lawes Treasury of Musick (1669) ii. 20 Short Love liking may find Jars, the Love that lasteth knows no Wars.

1834 T. De Quincey Sketches Life & Manners in Tait's Edinb. Mag. Mar. 93/1 Few men go, or can go, beyond a little love-liking, as it is called.

1880 J. Payne New Poems 2 I chide it for lack of love-liking.

c1390—1880(Hide quotations)

1609 T. Heywood Troia Britanica 221 Now I these Loue-lines write.

?1668 T. Jordan Wealth Out-witted Ep. sig. A2^v Those days were spent in Love-lines, Drolls and Laughter.

1709 Tatler No. 40. 242 Shall this fresh ornament of the world, These precious love-lines, pass with other common things Amongst the wastes of time.

1914 H. Wales Brocklebank Riddle 263 I've been told that I have a very interesting left hand. The love line is in the left hand.

1977 New Musical Express 16 Jan. 8/4 Little Bob looks up from Velda's love lines and takes a slug of Southern Comfort.

2006 Spokesman-Rev. (Spokane, Washington) (Nexis) 27 Oct. w12 The energy helps her interpret the lines of the palm, including the life line..and the heart or love line (from below the forefinger to below the pinky).

1609—2006(Hide quotations)

1656 Duchess of Newcastle Natures Pictures x. 346 A procuring Bawd is to make Love-matches, and contrive Love-meetings.

1869 A. Trollope He knew he was Right I. xxv. 194 It was little enough she got by marrying him... But it was a love-match.

1997 C. Shaw Sc. Myths & Customs ix. 211 Folklore invariably presents the marriage of Malcolm and Margaret as a love match.

1656—1997(Hide quotations)

1603 P. Holland tr. Plutarch Morals 1312 Eudoxus..asked the reason, why Ceres had no charge and superintendance over Love matters [Fr. des amours, Gk. τῶν ἐρωτικῶν].

1774 D. Turner Fashionable Daughter iii. 149 I do in reality think it an injury done a parent..to carry a love matter so far as I have undoubtedly done, without at least asking his consent.

1868 E. Edwards Life Sir W. Ralegh I. xv. 299 She was somewhat precocious in love matters.

2007 Daily News (N.Y.) (Nexis) 11 Feb. (Sports Final ed.) 37 Taurus... With love matters, stand up for yourself to avoid being taken advantage of.

1603—2007(Hide quotations)

1853 A. Houssaye Philosophers & Actresses 222 His hand..had constructed in this palace, a graceful love-nest for his young wife.

1919 U. Sinclair Brass Check xi. 65 So before long we began to notice dark hints in the newspapers; such esoteric phrases as 'Sinclair's love-nest'.

1970 G. Greer Female Eunuch 154 Nobody knew of his love-nest.

1972 'H. Howard' Nice Day for Funeral ix. 124 Pamela and Frankie were sharing a love-nest at Lakeland Towers.

1999 C. Brookmyre One Fine Day in Middle of Night (2000) 84 The bastard had been using the place as his own private, five-star love nest, and the skeleton staff on duty..had assumed she was his wife.

1853—1999(Hide quotations)

1795 J. Hunt Miscellany 25 The noise resembling the beating of a watch, is only the love-note of these animals.

1840 C. Norton Dream 205 The borrowed love-notes of thy echoing lyre.

1842 A. De Vere Waldenses 56 Take back this paper To Him that sent it... When I have written A little love note on the other side.

1940 R. Graves No more Ghosts 41 Dangerous it had been with love-notes To serenade Queen Famine.

1960 J. Kerouac Let. 14 Sept. in Sel. Lett. 1957–69 (1999) 263 I write the hostess a love note saying 'I love you because you're a simple brunette.'

2006 Time Out N.Y. 11 May 91/3 Tossed and forgotten items—love notes, missing-pet posters, grocery lists, etc.

1795—2006(Hide quotations)

1869 Catholic World 8 821/2 This love-object is a third person.

1916 Criminal Sci. Monogr. Sept. 249 The child is now capable of the choice of a love-object accompanied by erotic feelings.

1925 J. Riviere et al. tr. S. Freud Coll. Papers IV. 45 In the choice of their love-object they have taken as their model not the mother but their own selves.

1960 C. Day Lewis Buried Day vii. 137 When it became apparent that..as a love-object, I myself was unsatisfactory, she started on dogs.

1973 S. Fisher Female Orgasm xv. 437 Orgasm difficulties were observed to be linked to concern about the instability or potential loss of love objects.

2003 New Republic 12 May 37/2 A classic serial monogamist, Breton clung to the notion of l'amour fou, the idea of the one predestined love object.

1869—2003(Hide quotations)

1620 J. Lewis Ignis Cœlestis 104 By prayer we shall offer vp a loue-offering, sweet and delightfull to the Lord our God.

1791 J. White Adventures King Richard Coeur-de-lion II. xxviii. 168 [A] tender lay, to be presented as a love-offering to the incomparable Celestina.

1893 Decatur (Illinois) Daily Republican 16 Sept. The spokesman..presented the donations, and the parson..replied in a few touching and appropriate remarks. It was a love-offering from an appreciative people.

1935 Times 19 Nov. 16/6 (advt.) We need £200,000 in gifts or legacies. Send your donation, your love-offering..to the Treasurer.

1968 Jrnl. Sci. Stud. Relig. 7 29/2 Pentecostal financial activity is personal and reciprocal,..money is given as a 'love-offering' in direct proportion to the importance of the non-material gift that the donor feels he has received.

2006 Daily Star (Nexis) 3 Nov. 38 What is the most exotic love offering ever made? In third place is Emperor Shah Jahan who built the Taj Mahal in memory of his favourite wife.

1620—2006(Hide quotations)

a1627 T. Middleton No Wit (1657) i. 22 Peruse this love paper as you go. Mr Low. A Letter?

a1627—a1627(Hide quotations)

1661 Princess Cloria v. 512 Some years after these enterchanges of love passages, Astratius of a sudden,..waved her company.

1821 W. Scott Kenilworth xvi, in Waverley Novels (1831) XXII. 300 There had been some love passages betwixt him and Mistress Amy Robsart.

1845 C. M. Kirkland Western Clearings 106 No one..had ever been able to ascertain whether there had actually been any 'love-passages' between them or not.

1930 Galveston (Texas) Daily News 3 July 7/2 Fifi engages in her first love passage with the fugitive, Murray.

1661—1930(Hide quotations)

1846 U.S. Mag. & Democratic Rev. Mar. 211/1 Many of his subjects had a feeling sense of his royal grace and condescension, in the love-pats with which he honored them.

1876 C. D. Warner Winter on Nile i. 24 Garibaldi received one of his wounds, a sort of love-pat of fame.

1999 in A. Garrod et al. Souls looking Back xvi. 273 I couldn't bring myself to return her touch. We never talked about what her 'love pats' were about.

1846—1999(Hide quotations)

1889 A. Conan Doyle Micah Clarke xxxiv. 377 You are like the same ship when the battle and the storm have..torn the love-pennants from her peak.

1889—1889(Hide quotations)

1665 J. Crowne Pandion & Amphigenia 2 A lip-sick Lover, who with quaint Rhetorications can paint his Mistress face..and think her tears love philters.

1834 E. Bulwer-Lytton Last Days of Pompeii I. i. ii. 17 The very air seems to have taken a love philtre, so handsome does every face without a beard seem in my eyes.

1921 E. L. White Andivius Hedulio i. v. 74 She had a local reputation for magical powers in the way of spells..love philtres, fortune-telling..and good advice on all subjects.

1995 Nichols Garden Nursery 50/1 (advt.) Cupids [sic] Dart... Violet, daisy-like flowers with dark centers. The name refers to the Greek custom of using the plant in love philters.

1665—1995(Hide quotations)

a1645 W. Strode Floating Island (1655) iv. xiii. sig. E3/2 Sir Amorous buyes a Love-pill.

1859 Humbug vi. 45 Were an enterprising Yankee permitted to advertise 'Love Pills'..in one year he would amass a fortune.

1931 Lima (Ohio) News 24 Mar. 5/3 Balanescu was convicted of the sensational 'love pill killing' of Dorothy Kirk... The state alleged he fed the girl strange 'love potions' in a series of weird medical experiments until she died.

1968 T. Leary Politics of Ecstasy v. 100 Mind-altering chemicals... The scientist has to take the love pill.

1998 Mirror (Nexis) 21 July (Features section) 22 Our man..gives his verdict on the revolutionary love pill. My girlfriend Claire and I have a satisfying love life—but I couldn't turn down the chance to road-test Viagra.

2006 Daily Tel. (Sydney) (Nexis) 19 Aug. 5 (heading) Once..the drug of choice at rave parties and city nightclubs but now the love pill has come home.

a1645—2006(Hide quotations)

c1390 in F. J. Furnivall Minor Poems Vernon MS (1901) 474 Sore I seo þe buye Al my loue-plawe.

1651 J. Ellistone tr. J. Böhme Signatura Rerum xiii. 158 All things were in equal weight of all the properties in a Love-play, as it is even so now in Paradise.

a1672 P. Sterry Rise Kingdom of God (1683) 291 Thus Death becometh a Love-play between Christ, and his Spouse.

1821 Ld. Byron Marino Faliero (2nd issue) Pref. p. xx A tragedy of the highest order, and not a puling love-play.

1849 U.S. Mag. & Democratic Rev. Dec. 523 It was during the interlude of this dramatic love-play, that the editor of the Omni-Versus..returned to New-York.

1879 Times 24 June 10/3 The love play of Perdican and Camille, which ends so sadly and so suddenly in poor little Rosette's heartbroken cry.

1944 T. Rattigan While Sun Shines ii. 226 You're both very much mistaken if either of you imagines that you're going to have twopence-worth of verbal loveplay with my fiancée on my telephone.

1963 A. Heron Towards Quaker View of Sex 55 Adult heterosexuality presents fewer problems where early love play is tolerated than where it is suppressed.

c1390—1997(Hide quotations)

a1586 Sir P. Sidney Arcadia (1593) v. f. 242^v The drinke he had receiued, was neither..a loue potion, nor..a deadly poyson.

1647 R. Stapleton in tr. Juvenal Sixteen Satyrs 85 (margin) Philters or love-potions.

1787 G. Gregory tr. R. Lowth Lect. Sacred Poetry Hebrews II. iii. xxxi. 344 Mandrake was of especial efficacy in love potions.

1868 Amer. Naturalist 2 186 The flower is fleshy and fragrant, and the native doctors in India use it as a sort of love-potion.

1931 R. A. Firor Folkways in T. Hardy v. 115 Legends of the mandrake and of the 'Hand of Glory' are closely connected with love-potions.

2004 Daily Tel. 3 Nov. 7/1 A modern love potion for women..contains herbs reputed for centuries to have aphrodisiac qualities.

a1586—2004(Hide quotations)

1592 R. Greene Blacke Bookes Messenger sig. C4^v He will perswade you hee hath twentie receiptes of Loue powders.

1623 J. Webster Dutchesse of Malfy v. ii. sig. L4 Confesse to me Which of my women 'twas you hyr'd, to put Loue-powder into my drinke?

1678 S. Butler Hudibras: Third Pt. iii. i. 39 When he's with Love-powder laden, And Prim'd, and Cock'd by Miss, or Madam.

1742 J. Yarrow Love at First Sight 14 There are Things call'd Charms, Bribes, and Love-Powder.

1840 F. M. Trollope Michael Armstrong xii. 125 I don't know what love-powder you have been scattering amongst us, but there is not a single individual of the family who does not positively dote upon you.

1941 Louisiana: Guide to State (Federal Writers' Project) 99 To make a love powder, catch live humming birds, gut them without first killing them, dry the heart and powder it.

2004 L. Erdrich Four Souls (2005) ix. 110 Love powders sometimes double back and land upon their maker, which is why an expert is always required in their use.

1592—2004(Hide quotations)

1990 Sunday Mail (S. Austral.) (Nexis) 4 Feb. In the place of glowing welcomes..were headlines baring:..'love rat snubs his kid'.

1996 Daily Record (Glasgow) (Nexis) 19 Feb. 17 [He] was branded a love rat after rumours of an affair with his wife's best pal.

2003 C. Hopkins Starstruck 136 'Love rat.' 'That's a joke,' I said. 'I've only ever snogged three girls.'

1990—2003(Hide quotations)

1666 in W. M. Myddelton Chirk Castle Accts. 8 Jan. (1908) I. 140 3 doz. of love 2^d Rib. 6^s, 6 doz of 1^d love Riben 6^s.

1790 L. Paradise Let. 26 Sept. in T. Jefferson Papers (1965) XVII. 520 I will Mourn..Three Months in Black Silk and love Ribbons.

1882 S. F. A. Caulfeild & B. C. Saward Dict. Needlework 330/1 Love-Ribbon ..was employed to tie on Crape Hat-bands when worn at funerals, and is now occasionally worn by ladies in their caps.

1911 A. M. Earle Costume of Colonial Times 197 Among the ribbons advertised in the middle of the eighteenth century were paduasoy ribbons, love ribbons,..and..liberty ribbons.

2003 J. Flanders Victorian House (2004) x. 333 Mutes, also with staffs, which had a 'love ribbon' tied on each one, in black normally, or in white for a young girl.

1666—2003(Hide quotations)

a1754 W. Hamilton Poems & Songs (1850) 25 Averse she fled The pleasing love-rights of the marriage bed.

1857 H. Melville Confidence-man xxxix. 286 I have been deceived..in this man; he is no true friend that, in platonic love to demand love-rites?

1998 Washington Times (Nexis) 21 Apr. a4 We asked whether she would similarly denounce the love rites of homosexuals.

1600—1998(Hide quotations)

?1710 Keach's Instr. for Children (new ed.) 41 The Devil teaches them..to read Love Romances, and frequent Play-Houses.

1820 T. Hodgskin Trav. N. Germany II. xiv. 448 The daughters were obliged to spin and sew; and..dared not read love-romances.

1903 Critic (N.Y.) Oct. 379/1 The first of these novels is a somewhat unreal and exaggerated love-romance of the Civil War.

2001 V. I. Braginsky Contemp. Stud. Trad. Asian Lit. 41 The text of the religious Canon includes fragments in various genres: religious sermons..heroic epics..and love romances (the story of Yusuf and Zulaykha).

?1710—2001(Hide quotations)

1639 P. Massinger Unnaturall Combat iii. iii. sig. G2^v I will bring you Where you..may see The love-scæne acted.

1749 J. Cleland Mem. Woman of Pleasure I. 72 To..a recital of the love-scene, I had..been spectatress of.

1818 Theatr. Inquisitor 13 183 Love-scenes..which both French and English writers..regard as absolutely essential to their drama.

1850 J. Hannay Singleton Fontenoy I. i. iii. 35 Circe resumed a love-scene between Adèle and the tender forçat.

1932 R. Campbell Taurine Provence 37 Read his [sc. Shaw's] miserable love-letters (published) and his 'love-scene' between Caesar and Cleopatra.

1999 T. Parsons Man & Boy (2000) xxxii. 279 Charlie wanted to fast forward over the love scenes and moments of reflection and get straight to the combat.

1639—1999(Hide quotations)

1847 Charleston (Va.) Gaz. 19 Dec. 3/5 (advt.) Sofas and love seats, and convenient occasional chairs, all in the loveliest colors.

1904 P. Macquoid Hist. Eng. Furnit. ix. 220 Double chairs or love-seats.

1915 F. W. Burgess Antique Furnit. 205 Such settees which closely resemble an adaptation of two single chairs, are commonly called 'love-seats'.

1970 Canad. Antiques Collector Dec. 21/1 A Victorian love seat Mr. Daniel saw being hauled away in a garbage truck.

1973 'D. Halliday' Dolly & Starry Bird x. 151 Johnson..kissed her, and then..found a love seat and dropped there beside her.

2006 Metro (Toronto) 5 Jan. 23/3 They were the first to carry three sofa sizes: the standard three-seater, the 'mini' sofa and the love seat.

1847—2006(Hide quotations)

1523 J. Fitzherbert Bk. Surueyeng ix. f. 9^v But and he [sc. the tenant] bye his corne in the market or other places, he is than at lybertie to grynde where he may be best serued, that maner of grynding is called loue Socone, and the lordes tenauntes be called bonde socon.

[ 1656 T. Blount Glossographia (at cited word) There is Bond-socome,..and Love-Socome. [Also in later dictionaries.]]

1523—1523(Hide quotations)

1891 Daily Nevada State Jrnl. 29 Oct. 1/3 The latest outbreak of the souvenir spoon mania is a 'love spoon'. The bowl is heart shaped and of bright gold.

1918 W. R. Butterfield in Connoisseur Aug. 191/1 At first,..love-spoons did not differ greatly from the wooden spoons in ordinary use in the household.

1968 J. Arnold Shell Bk. Country Crafts 193 The Welsh carvers..produced a great deal of fine work, amongst which were the celebrated love-spoons.

1972 Country Life 20 Jan. 160/2 These [sc. stay busks] were rather in the manner of Welsh love-spoons and were made by young men for their intended marriage partners.

2005 Brit. Life Jan. 66/3 An ancient craft and a cultural symbol, the Welsh lovespoon is a token traditionally given by a young man to his beloved. Locked within each design is a special message.

1891—2005(Hide quotations)

1605 G. Chapman Al Fooles i. i Where I am cloyde, And being bound to loue sports, care not for them.

a1672 P. Sterry Disc. Freedom of Will (1675) ii. 159 They lie naturally and nakedly in the bosom of each other, according to their Divine Love-sport and play in the Palace of their Father.

1857 J. A. Heraud Judgem. of Flood (rev. ed.) i. ii. iii. 59 They gambolled in the love-sport, like with like.

1598—1857(Hide quotations)

1594 T. Nashe Vnfortunate Traveller sig. E4 Not a litle was I delighted with this vnexpected loue story.

1624 P. Massinger Bond-man i. iii. sig. B4 They cannot..Vsher vs to our Litters, tell loue Stories.

1781 T. Warton Hist. Eng. Poetry III. xxi. 57 This was the most favorite love-story of our old poetry.

1822 J. Clare Let. 5 Nov. (1985) 250 I keep writing on with my love story & think worse & worse of it as I proceed.

1890 J. M. Barrie My Lady Nicotine xxiii. 190 The tragedy..is led up to by a pathetic love-story.

1938 E. Goudge Towers in Mist xvi. 343 That famous love story, so wrapped up in legend now that it was hard to disentangle truth from falsehood.

2002 Time 25 Feb. 62/2 Crossroads and A Walk to Remember are old-fashioned chick flicks, one a gal-bonding movie, the other a love story.

1594—2002(Hide quotations)

1592 T. Nashe Pierce Penilesse (Huntington Libr. copy) sig. F2^v Is it..fine grace in telling of a loue tale amongst Ladies, can make a man reuerenst of the multitude?

1633 J. Shirley Bird in Cage v. I 2 b Forgetting all their legends, and Loue tales Of Venus, Cupid, and the scapes of Joue.

1773 R. Graves Spiritual Quixote I. iii. v. 135 She has not been entertained with a single love-tale.

1802 J. Ritson Anc. Eng. Metrical Romanceës I. p. vii The love-tales of Longus, Heliodorus, and Xenophon of Ephesus.

1933 I. Gershwin Luckiest Man in World in Compl. Lyrics (1993) 198/1 It's quite the perfect love tale; In ev'ry way we dovetail.

1998 Jrnl. (Newcastle) (Nexis) 13 Feb. 28 This bitter-sweet love tale from Hong Kong seems an unlikely mood-enhancer at first.

1592—1998(Hide quotations)

1829 Offering for 1829 82 I verily believe he would have spent half the night in mustering up the requisite courage for a gentle love-tap.

1889 'M. Twain' Connecticut Yankee xxxiii. 426 When I make up my mind to hit a man, I don't plan out a love-tap.

1988 M. Cohen Living on Water 135 He made a mock fist and hit me on the chest, one of those little love-taps men give to each other.

2002 N.Y. Times (National ed.) 22 Nov. b17/2 The dramatic information is slipped into the movie with devastating panache: a love tap delivered with the force of a speeding car.

1829—2002(Hide quotations)

c1275 (▸?a1200) Laȝamon Brut (Calig.) (1963) 86 For he heo heuede swiþe ilofeð [read ilofed], & luf-þing hire biheite.

c1275—c1275(Hide quotations)

1493 (▸c1410) Dives & Pauper (Pynson) x. viii. I iij b Y^t mischeif is noo curse but a louetyk of god.

1635 F. Quarles Emblemes iii. vi. 146 Her frownes..may chance to show An angry love-trick [read -tick] on his arme, or so.

1493—1635(Hide quotations)

1909 La Crosse (Wisconsin) Tribune 21 June 1/1 Two yellow men and the pretty 20 year old missionary girl..form the love triangle the police have uncovered.

1924 I. Gershwin Not so long Ago in Compl. Lyrics (1993) 41/1 If you want my angle on the love triangle, I'm for no front-headline stunts.

1999 S. L. Kasfir Contemp. Afr. Art iv. 116 One source of conflict for these women is the love triangle—husband, wife and girlfriend (or husband, older wife and new wife).

2004 D. Klinger Into Kill Zone v. 230 It turned out to involve three guys that were living together, with some type of love triangle.

1909—2004(Hide quotations)

1835 Rhode-Island Republican 27 May 3/1 (advt.) Black Love Veils! A large and splendid article for mourning, rec'd. this day at May 27.

1889 Harper's Mag. Oct. 696/1 I'd rip up an' press an' clean ladies' dresses, an' do over their crape an' love veils.

1835—1889(Hide quotations)

1789 E. Darwin Bot. Garden: Pt. II 93 The squab Fiend..Seeks some love-wilder'd Maid with sleep oppress'd.

1875 W. B. Scott Poems 39 Love-wildered, I had lost my head.

1946 'S. O'Sullivan' Dublin Poems 64 Your noble silence shames my wronging thought, And all the doubts and vain imaginings wrought In the dim ways of this love-wildered brain.

1789—1946(Hide quotations)

?a1300 Dame Sirith 375 in G. H. McKnight Middle Eng. Humorous Tales (1913) 17 Leue dame, if eni clerc Bedeþ þe þat loue-werc, Ich rede þat þou grante his bone.

1673 J. Dryden Assignation iv. iii. 46 She's most confoundedly ugly. If ever we had come to Love-work, and a Candle had been brought us, I had faln back from that face, like a Buck Rabbet in coupling.

1813 'T. Brown' Intercepted Lett. 23 The Marchesa and he..Have taken much lately to whispering in doorways;..And a house such as mine is, with door-ways so small, Has no room for such cumbersome love-work at all!

1936 G. J. Nathan Theatre of Moment (1970) iii. 44 It is Juliet again who has to do the love work.

?a1300—1936(Hide quotations)

C7. In names of plants and animals.

1970 Florida Entomol. 53 23 My first encounters with the 'love-bugs' were in south Louisiana in the mid-1930's.

2004 C. Bateman Driving Big Davie xxxi. 305 A pair of love bugs were mating on our windscreen. A few days ago I would have put the wipers on and squished them. Now I let them be.

1937—2004(Hide quotations)

1814 J. Lunan Hortus Jamaicensis I. 266 Cuscuta Americana... The negroes of Liguanea mountains call it love-bush.

1954 Farmer's Guide (Jamaica Agric. Soc.) 582 The common Love-bushes of Jamaica comprise about four species of Cuscuta.

1986 O. P. Adisa Bake-Face & Other Guava Stories 16 Her eyes stare at the hedges of love-bush, the seeds of which Carol scattered a few months ago when asking for Richard's love.

1814—1986(Hide quotations)

1702 J. Petiver in Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) 23 1257 What is peculiar in this Love-grass is its having just under each spike, its stalk clammy.

1855 G. Emerson Farmer's & Planter's Encycl. Rural Affairs (new ed.) 737/2 Love-grass ... It is a pretty species of foreign grass, growing in gardens about a foot high in any common soil.

1945 J. M. Fogg Weeds of Lawn & Garden 42 Fields solidly occupied by Purple Lovegrass are a conspicuous and attractive feature of the autumn landscape.

2000 High Country News 6 Nov. 4 (caption) Refuge planner Bonnie Swarbrick walks through a field of healthy—but non-native—Lehmann lovegrass.

1702—2000(Hide quotations)

[ 1760 J. Lee Introd. Bot. App. 317 Tree of Love, Cercis.]

1866 J. Lindley & T. Moore Treasury Bot. II. 697/1 Love-Tree. Cercis siliquastrum.

1889 Gettysburg (Pa.) Compiler 20 Aug. 1/8 In the Allegheny City green-house is a rare tropical plant called the 'love-tree.' Its fruit blends the flavor of the peach, the pine apple and other sweet fruits.

2005 Irish Times (Nexis) 27 Aug. (Mag.) 32 A species with which to catch out your know-all horticultural friends is Cercis siliquastrum... It's also called the love tree. Could it be because of its heart-shaped leaves?

1866—2005(Hide quotations)

1833 A. Eaton Man. Bot. (ed. 6) 116 Cuscuta americana, dodder, love-vine.

1885 A. Brassey In Trades 325 The long tendrils of the love-vine rolled up into coils, which he assured us would live and grow for years, if hung on a nail indoors.

1935 Jrnl. Amer. Folklore 48 333 If you get a section of love vine and move it to another place, name it after the person about whom you want to know whether he or she is a lover of yours or not, and if the vine lives, the person does love you; if the vine dies, he or she does not.

1974 Nevada State Jrnl. 29 Sept. 39/6 I came across several plants entwined with dodder, otherwise known as love-vine. And love plants it does! It smothers them to death with its long golden strands.

1833—1974(Hide quotations)

This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2008; most recently modified version published online September 2021).

Entry history
Entry profile
Previous version:
OED2 (1989)

In this entry:

all's fair in love and war
fall (or †yfall, also †be taken, caught) in love, to
fall out of love (with), to
for (also †of) all loves
for love
for love
for love or money
for love's sake
for my (our, etc.) love
for the love of
for the love of God
for the love of Mike
give (also bear) love to, to
(give, †commend, †remember) my love to —
in love (with)
in the love of
in the love of God
love (—)
love-adept
love adventure
love-all
love allegory
love amour
love at first sight
love-awe
love-badge
love ballad
love beads
love-bed
love-begotten
love bend
love-bind
love bite
love-blink
love bond
love-book
love-born
love-boy
love brat
love-breathing
love broker
love-broking
love bug
love bush
love call
love cause
love chant
love charm
love comic
love creeper
love-crossed
love-cup
love curl
love dance
love darg
love dart
love-darting
love-deed
love-deep
love desire
love-devouring
love discourse
love-dittied
love ditty
love dose
love draught
love-dread
love dream
love drug
love-drunk
love duel
love duet
love elegy
love-enthralled
love eye
love-favour
love-feat
love fest
love fever
love-fit
love-flight
love-fond
love-frayner
love game
love-gift
love-glance
love glove
love god
love goddess
lovegrass
love handle
love-hate
love-hate
love-hating
love-hatred
love heart
love-hood
love-illumined
love in a cottage
love in disguise
love-inspired
love-inspiring
love-instructed
love interest
love intrigue
love is blind
love-laboured
love-lacking
love-lad
love-laden
love-lake
love-lass
love-late
love-laughing
love-learned
love-libel
love life
love-light
love-lighted
love-liking
love line
love-lit
love-look
love-lore
love lyric
love-mad
love-madness
love magic
love marriage
love match
love matter
love meeting
love-melancholy
love-money
love-monger
love-mongering
love-mourning
love nest
love-nettled
love note
love object
love-ode
love of benevolence
love of complacency
love offering
love-open
love paper
love-parakeet
love-parrot
love-pass
love passage
love-passion
love pat
love-pennant
love-pensive
love-performing
love philtre
love pill
love play
love-plot
love poem
love-poet
love poetry
love potion
love powder
love-prank
love-prate
love-proof
love-quarrel
love-quick
love rat
love-rhyme
love ribbon
love rites
love romance
love ron
love roun
love scene
love seal
love seat
love-secret
love-service
love-shaft
love-shaked
love-shell
love-smitten
love soken
love sonnet
love speech
love-spent
love-spoon
love-sport
love-spring
love-starved
love story
love-stricken
love-suit
love's young dream
love tale
love-talk
love-talking
love tap
love-tear
love that dare not speak its name, the
love theme
love-thing
love thought
love-tick
love-tight
love, to
love tooth
love-touched
love-toy
love tree
love triangle
love-trick
love veil
love verse
love vine
love visit
love-whispering
love-wildered
love word
love work
love-wounded
make love, not war
make love, not war, to
make love, to
marry for love, to
of all love
out of love (with)
play of love, the
send one's love, to
take (also nim) love to, to
there's no love lost between them (also us, etc.)
under love and law
upon all loves
(with) love from —
(with) love to —
yfall (also be brought) into love's dance, to

In other dictionaries:

lǒve, n.(1) in Middle English Dictionary

Sort by: Entry | Date

lovable, adj.2 c1422
lovableness, n. 1824
lovably, adv.1 ?a1425
lovably, adv.2 1825
lovage, n.1 c1300
lovage, n.2 1489
lovanenty, int. 1824
lovastatin, n. 1986
Lovat, n. 1895
love, n.1 eOE
love, n.2 1865
love, v.1 eOE
love, v.2 OE
love affair, n. 1598
love-and-idle, n. 1630
love apple, n. 1578
lovebird, n. 1597
love boat, n. 1870
love bomb, n. 1909
love-bomb, v. 1976

love-bombing, n. 1976
love-child, n. 1805
lovecop, n. 1252
loved, adj. and n. OE
loveday, n. c1300
love-drink, n. c1330
love-drury, n. c1300
lovee, n. 1753
love entangled, n. 1836
love-feast, n. 1573
loveful, adj. ?c1225
love-in, n. 1967
love-in-a-mist, n. 1731
love-in-a-puzzle, n. 1824
love-in-idle, n. 1664
love-in-idleness, n. 1578
love-juice, n. 1593
lovekin, n. 1896
lovekins, n. 1920
love-knot, n. c1400

Long Cool Coll Woman in a Black Dress Lyrics

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Long Cool Coll Woman in a Black Dress Lyrics

love, n.¹

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Long Cool Coll Woman in a Black Dress Lyrics

love, n.1

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love, n.¹