Meanings
nounapple-wife (plural apple-wives)
plural apple-wives
- archaicA female apple-seller.
Last night ye haggled and argle-bargled like an apple-wife; and then passed me your word, and gave me your hand to back it; and ye ken very well what was the upshot. Be damned to your word!
1886 May 1 – July 31, Robert Louis Stevenson, “The Captain Knuckles Under”, in Kidnapped, being Memoirs of the Adventures of David Balfour in the Year 1751: […], London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 1886, →OCLC, page 97
Cite this entry
APA
apple-wife. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/apple-wife
MLA
“apple-wife.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/apple-wife. Accessed November 4, 2026.
Chicago
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “apple-wife,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/apple-wife.
Source: apple-wife on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.