couching

Verb

couch (third-person singular simple present couches, present participle couching, simple past and past participle couched)

1. (intransitive) To lie down; to recline (upon a couch or other place of repose).
   • Why did you ſo, doth not the Gentleman / Deſerue as full as fortunate a bed, / As euer Beatrice ſhall couch upon?1598–1599, William Shakespeare, “Much Adoe about Nothing”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies, London: Printed by Isaac...

   Synonyms:

   lie down, recline

2. (intransitive) To bend the body, as in reverence, pain, labor, etc.; to stoop; to crouch.
   • At laſt, as thro an open Plain they yode, / They ſpy'd a Knight, that towards pricked fair, / And him beſide an aged Squire there rode, / That ſeem'd to couch under his Shield three-ſquare, / As if that Age bad him that Burden ſpare, / And yield it thoſe that ſtouter could it wield: […]1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 4
3. (transitive) To lay something upon a bed or other resting place.
   • But where vnbruſed youth with vnſtuft braine / Doth couch his lims, there, golden ſleepe doth raigne; […]c. 1591–1595?, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Romeo and Ivliet”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies, London: Printed...
4. (transitive) To arrange or dispose as if in a bed.
   • [T]he Sea and the Land make one Globe, and the waters couch themſelves, as cloſe as may be, to the Center of this Globe in a Spherical convexity; ſo that if all the Mountains and Hills were ſcal'd, and the Earth made even, the Waters would not overflow its ſmooth ſurface; […]1684, Thomas Burnet, The Theory of the Earth: Containing an Account of the Original of the Earth, and of All the General Changes which it Hath Already Undergone, or Is to Undergo, Till the...
5. (transitive) To lay or deposit in a bed or layer; to bed.
   • It is, at this Day, in uſe, in Gaza, to couch Pot-Sheards or Veſſels of Earth, in their Walls, to gather the Wind from the top, and to paſſe it downe in Spouts into Roomes. It is a Device for Freſhneſſe, in great Heats; […]1627, Francis Bacon, “VIII. Century”, in Sylua Syluarum: or A Naturall Historie: in Ten Centuries. VVritten by the Right Honourable Francis Lo[rd] Verulam Viscount St. Alban. Published after the...
6. (transitive) To lower (a spear or lance) to the position of attack.
   • And fairly couching his ſteel-headed Spear, / Him firſt ſaluted with a ſturdy Stroke: / It booted nought Sir Guyon, coming near, / To think ſuch hideous Puiſſance on foot to bear.1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto V”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 3

See all 21 meanings of couch