Also 4, 9 liche-wake, 6, 9 lyk(e)wa(i)ke, 6–7 like-, lyke-walk, 8–9 lake-wake, 9 lychwake. Cf. LATE-WAKE. [f. lyke, LICH + WAKE sb.] The watch kept at night over a dead body.
c. 1386. Chaucer, Knt.’s T., 2100. Ne how that lych wake was yholde Al thilke nyght,… kepe I nat to seye.
1513. Douglas, Æneis, X. ix. 31. Quham that he etlis for to send from thens, To Pallas likewalkis.
1558. Richmond Wills (Surtees, 1853), 127. Ther shall be no yong folkes at my lykewaike.
1623. in Pitcairn, Crim. Trials, III. 549. At quhose lyke-walk … the ox foirsaid was slane and eittin.
a. 1775. Fair Mary of Wallington, xix. in Child, Ballads, II. 311/2. Your daughter … bids you come to her sickening, or her merry lake-wake.
1832. Carlyle, Misc. (1857), III. 114. At all lykewakes, the doings and endurances of the Departed are the theme.
1878. W. C. Smith, Hilda (1879), 192. I heard them … moan their rugged lyke-wakes in the ancient Runic rhymes.
attrib. 1805. Scott, Last Minstr., IV. xxvi. Our slogan is their lyke-wake dirge.
1837. Sir F. Palgrave, Merch. & Friar (1844), 99. The lyke-wake train was seen advancing towards them.
