accouchement

A1C3C3O1U1C3H4E1M3E1N1T1
/əˈkuːʃmənt/

noun

Delivery in childbed; parturition

“Custom required that the royal family and the whole Court should be present at the accouchement of the Princesses.”

Similar
childbirthchildbearingvaginal birth
OriginFrench accouchement ← Old French acouchier ← Latin ad- →
Scrabble 23
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Meanings

nounaccouchement (countable and uncountable, plural accouchements)

plural accouchements

  1. countableuncountableDelivery in childbed; parturition

    Custom required that the royal family and the whole Court should be present at the accouchement of the Princesses.

    3 more examples

    The prevalence of the reports contradictory to this supposed legitimacy, rendered it necessary to be more minute, than might in common cases have been requisite, in proving the precise time and place of Lady Jane Douglas's alledged accouchement […]

    1763 June, “An account of the law-suit concerning the succession to the late Duke of Douglas, continued”, in The Scots Magazine, volume 25, page 308

    a third was battling with a cat and her brood of kittens for a pair of old boots which she had been pleased to make the seat of her accouchement

    1820, [Charles Robert Maturin], Melmoth the Wanderer: A Tale. […], volume I, Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Company, and Hurst, Robinson, and Co., […], →OCLC, page 156

    A physician was occupied in making an autopsia of a woman dead of puerperal fever, when some one came for him to terminate an accouchement in the town.

    1856, St. Louis Medical and Surgical Journal, volume 14, page 153

Synonyms & antonyms

nounthe parturition process in human beings; having a baby; the process of giving birth to a child

Similar
childbirthchildbearingvaginal birth
Broader
parturitionbirthgiving birth
Also see
childbearingchildbirthvaginal birth

Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.

Origin

  1. Latinad-
  2. Old Frenchacouchier“to lay down, put to bed, go to bed”
  3. Frenchaccoucher“to be delivered of a child, to aid in delivery”
  4. Frenchaccouchement
  5. Englishaccouchement

Borrowed from French accouchement, from French accoucher (“to be delivered of a child, to aid in delivery”), from Old French acouchier (“to lay down, put to bed, go to bed”), from Latin ad- + collocare (“to lay, put, place”). See collate.

More words from French, Old French, Latin

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

accouchement. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/accouchement

MLA

“accouchement.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/accouchement. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “accouchement,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/accouchement.

Source: accouchement on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.