Medewife

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. An archaic spelling for a woman who helps other women through pregnancy, labour and the delivery of a baby
2. An older variant spelling referring to a female attendant who assists during childbirth and the care of the newborn
3. A historical term for a woman trained to attend mothers in labour and deliver their children

Etymology: Despite the modern spelling, the "mid" in this word has nothing to do with the middle. It comes from Old English "mid," meaning "with," the same root that survives in "amid" and "midst." A midwife was, literally, the "with-woman," the woman who stays with the mother during childbirth. The spelling "medewife" is a Middle English variant, in which the vowel of "mid" was written in several ways before the modern form settled. The second half, "wife," also meant something different. In Old English, "wif" meant "woman" in general, and only later narrowed to the sense of a married woman. So "midwife" once named a role, not a marital status, and the word kept its older sense of "woman" in the compound long after the standalone "wife" had narrowed.