castling

Definition

An abortion, or a premature birth.

Etymology

From cast + -ling.

Example Sentences

• "1646: Wherein notwithstanding, we should rather rely upon the urine in a castling’s bladder — Sir Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica, Book II, ch 5"
• "From the Celeste's own image was the first castling molded. A soft, delicate creature of flesh and blood she would call Woman. So that Her castlings may never feel the loneliness she Herself did suffer, she bestowed woman with a mate [...]"
• "[…] ſhift for themselves, and ſeek out new habitations; ſuch caſtlings might in their waudring throughout the South Sea (moſt of the Oriental Iſlands being formerly inhabited by their Off-ſpring) fall with the coaſt of Peru, […]"