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uxor

uxor

9.9
A wife used especially in legal or Latin phrases
  • noun
  • /ˈʌksɔr/
  • Formal
translation icon : esposa
  • The judge emphasized the importance of the uxor in matters of inheritance laws.

Examples

  • In the document, the term uxor is used to refer to a wife in a legal context.

  • Rights in a woman as wife, uxor, and as mother, genetrix (i.e., rights in her children are held by virtue of holding rights in genetricem), determined the relative power and permanence of the gender position (Bohannan 1949:278).

    Academic text (1998)
  • During the trial, the lawyer argued that the uxor deserved certain rights under the marriage contract.

Synonyms

spouse
vsuxor
272 1.0

A person who is married to someone

is specifically the female partner rather than a gender-neutral one
missus
vsuxor
  • UK
63 8.1

A man's wife or female partner

is used in formal legal or Latin contexts rather than in speech
ux.
vsuxor
  • Formal
9.9

A wife named in legal documents

is the full rare Latin word rather than the abbreviation

Surface Forms

uxor singular
uxores plural

Etymology

Uxor is from Latin and means 'wife', and it is still used in legal phrases like 'et uxor' to mean 'and wife'. A helpful way to remember it is to notice English words like uxorious ('very fond of one's wife') and uxoricide ('killing of one's wife') that use the same root, so uxor today is a formal or legal word for 'wife'.