Word.ws English Dictionary

lying-in

lying-in noun: the final stages of pregnancy; accouchement.

Noun

lying-in (plural lying-ins or lyings-in)

  1. The final stages of pregnancy; accouchement.
    • from our first knowing each other, which was soon after my lying-in, we were almost inseparable companions […]1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, Folio Society, published 1973, page 404
    • One of them went to the pail, and finding no water in it, cried out to the others, what must they do to christen the child? On which they replied it should be done in beer. With that the seeming parson took the child in his arms, and performed the ceremony of baptism, dipping his head into a great...1850, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, London: H.G. Bohn, page 400
  2. A period of postpartum confinement, typically a month or longer, formerly common in Europe and still practiced in some parts of the world.
    • As she lay by the birth-fire, she gazed on the face of the child asleep in the bamboo cradle […] Once free from the lying-in, Linchong set herself to bringing up the baby.1995, Meredith Borthwick, transl., Many Lives, Kukrit Pramoj, pages 177–8
  3. (historical) The process of childbirth and the immediate postpartum recovery period of rest and confinement in bed.
    • '[…] as soon as she recovered from her lying-in, for I found her near her delivery […]'1811, [Jane Austen], chapter IX, in Sense and Sensibility […], volume II, London: […] C[harles] Roworth, […], and published by T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC

Adjective

lying-in (not comparable)

  1. of, or relating to childbirth
  2. of, or relating to postpartum confinement

lying-in meaning in Tamil

lying-in in Tamil

பிள்ளை பெறல், பெற்றல், பேற்று

Forms of lying-in

plurallying-ins
plurallyings-in

Questions about lying-in

What does lying-in mean?
Lying-in means the final stages of pregnancy; accouchement.
What is lying-in in Tamil?
Lying-in in Tamil is பிள்ளை பெறல், பெற்றல், பேற்று. See Lying-in meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is lying-in?
Lying-in can be a noun or an adjective.
What is the plural of lying-in?
The plural of lying-in is lying-ins.

Words near lying-in in the dictionary

  1. lying through one's teeth
  2. lying to
  3. lying upon
  4. lying waste
  5. lying with
  6. lying-in
  7. lying-ins
  8. lyinger
  9. lyingest
  10. lyingly
  11. lyings

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: lying-in (page history and authors); lying-in (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-lying-in.wav.

Cite this entry: “lying-in.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/lying-in. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.