Dictionary

suckle

Pronunciation

Noun

suckle (plural suckles)

(obsolete) A teat.
- 1638, Sir Thomas Herbert, 1st Baronet, Some yeares travels into divers parts of Asia and Afrique, London: Jacob Blome and Richard Bishop, “Travels begun Anno 1626,” Book 1, p. 26,
  […] the body of this fish [the Mannatee] is commonly 3 yards long and one broad, slow in swimming, wanting fins, in their place ayded with 2 paps which are not only suckles but stilts to creep a shoare upon such time she grazes […]

Verb

suckle (suckles, present participle suckling; past and past participle suckled)

(transitive) To give suck to; to nurse at the breast, udder, or dugs.
- circa 1607 William Shakespeare, Coriolanus, Act I, Scene 3,
  […] the breasts of Hecuba
  When she did suckle Hector, looked not lovelier
  Than Hector’s forehead when it spit forth blood
  At Grecian sword, contemning.
- 1826, Walter Savage Landor, Imaginary Conversations, London: Henry Colburn, 2nd edition, Volume I, “The Lord Brooke and Sir Philip Sidney,” p. 35,
  Let us indulge them; they are not weak, suckled by Wisdom, taught to walk by Virtue.
(intransitive) To nurse; to suck milk from a nursing mother.
- 1931, Pearl S. Buck, The Good Earth, New York: Modern Library, 1944, Chapter 4, p. 35,
  But out of the woman’s great brown breast the milk gushed forth for the child, milk as white as snow, and when the child suckled at one breast it flowed like a fountain from the other, and she let it flow.
(transitive) To nurse from (a breast, nursing mother, etc.).
- 1982, Bernard Malamud, God's Grace, New York: Avon, 1983, p. 60
  Buz attempted to suckle his left nipple.
- 1997, Ridley Pearson, Beyond Recognition, New York: Hyperion, p. 129,
  She opened her eyes slightly, like a person drugged—dreamy and quiet. The baby suckled her.

Translations

Translations

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