English Explanatory Dictionary

morning gift

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. A gift traditionally given in some (especially Germanic) cultures by the husband to his wife on the first morning after they were married.

Word forms

morning gift morning gifts morning-gift

Etymology

Normalisation (after morning and gift) of Middle English morgengive, morhȝive, from Old English morgenġifu, morgenġiefu (“morning gift”), from Proto-Germanic *murgnagebō (“morning gift”), equivalent to morning + gift. Cognate with Dutch morgengave (“morning gift”), German Morgengabe (“morning gift”).

Related words

morganatic
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
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