MATRIMONY

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IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does matrimony mean? 

• MATRIMONY (noun)
  The noun MATRIMONY has 2 senses:

1. the state of being a married couple voluntarily joined for life (or until divorce)

2. the ceremony or sacrament of marriage

  Familiarity information: MATRIMONY used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• MATRIMONY (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The state of being a married couple voluntarily joined for life (or until divorce)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Synonyms:

marriage; matrimony; spousal relationship; union; wedlock

Context example:

God bless this union

Hypernyms ("matrimony" is a kind of...):

marital status (the condition of being married or unmarried)

Domain category:

jurisprudence; law (the collection of rules imposed by authority)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "matrimony"):

bigamy (the state of having two spouses at the same time)

common-law marriage (a marriage relationship created by agreement and cohabitation rather than by ceremony)

endogamy; inmarriage; intermarriage (marriage within one's own tribe or group as required by custom or law)

exogamy; intermarriage (marriage to a person belonging to a tribe or group other than your own as required by custom or law)

marriage of convenience (a marriage for expediency rather than love)

misalliance (an unsuitable alliance (especially with regard to marriage))

monandry (the state of having only one husband at a time)

monogamousness; monogamy (the practice or state of having only one spouse at a time)

open marriage (a marriage in which each partner is free to enter into extraneous sexual relationships without guilt or jealousy from the other)

cuckoldom (the state of a husband whose wife has committed adultery)

polygamy (the condition or practice of having more than one spouse at a time)

sigeh (a Shiite tradition of temporary marriage permitted in Iran that allows a couple to specify the terms of their relationship; can last from a few minutes to 99 years)

Derivation:

matrimonial (of or relating to the state of marriage)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The ceremony or sacrament of marriage

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Hypernyms ("matrimony" is a kind of...):

sacrament (a formal religious ceremony conferring a specific grace on those who receive it; the two Protestant ceremonies are baptism and the Lord's Supper; in the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church there are seven traditional rites accepted as instituted by Jesus: baptism and confirmation and Holy Eucharist and penance and holy orders and matrimony and extreme unction)

 Context examples 

But, my dear papa, you are no friend to matrimony; and therefore why should you be so anxious to pay your respects to a bride?

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

He was to be describing and recommending matrimony to me.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

What was important to her was matrimony.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

No question about his right: but have you never observed that, of all the tales told here about matrimony, Mr. Rochester has been favoured with the most lively and the most continuous?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

I am glad you are no enemy to matrimony, however.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

But thirty-five has nothing to do with matrimony.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

I did not know before, that I had two daughters on the brink of matrimony.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

Woman sort of a martyr, eh? —crucified on the cross of matrimony? The doctor nodded.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

She must be allowed to be a favourer of matrimony, you know; and (since self will intrude) who can say that she may not have some flying visions of attending the next Lady Elliot, through Mrs Wallis's recommendation?

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

I always say this is quite one of the evils of matrimony.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)