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green gown. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
green gown, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
green gown in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
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English
Pronunciation
Noun
green gown (plural green gowns)
- (archaic, historical) A dress that has been stained green from rolling in the grass; generally with allusion to sexual activity, especially a woman's loss of virginity.
1604 or 1605 (date written), Thomas Dekker, The Second Part of The Honest Whore, , London: Elizabeth All-de, for Nathaniel Butter, published 1630, →OCLC, Act I, signature A2, recto:Oh, a morning to tempt Ioue frõ his Ningle Ganimed, vvhich is but to giue Dary VVenches greene govvnes as they are going a milking; […]
1621, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy, , Oxford, Oxfordshire: John Lichfield and Iames Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition 3, section 2, member 2, subsection 4:Sometimes they lie open and are most tractable and coming, apt, yielding, and willing to embrace, to take a green gown, with that shepherdess in Theocritus, Idyll. 27, to let their coats, etc. […]
1723, Charles Walker, Memoirs of Sally Salisbury, section II:Who first gave our SALLY a Green-Gown is uncertain, but it is reported by many […] that upon being admitted an Honorary Member of Mrs. Wisebourn's Academy, she was, (tho' very indifferently) arrayed in that Colour […]
1814, Frances Burney, The Wanderer, section III.4:The boy […] flung himself upon Juliet, with all his force; protesting that he would give her a green gown.