a. [f. SPOUSE sb.]
1. Of a person: Having no spouse; bereaved or deprived of a spouse.
1460. Pol., Rel., & Love Poems (1866), 207. Broþerles, Spouselees, ful wrecchid y-wis.
1610. Healey, St. Aug. Citie of God, III. xiii. 122. Here a husband fights, and there a father; Would you be spouselesse (wiues) or fatherlesse?
1725. Pope, Odyss., I. 315. To tempt the spouseless queen with am’rous wiles, Resort the nobles from the neighb’ring isles.
1818. Byron, Ch. Har., IV. xi. The spouseless Adriatic mourns her lord.
1892. Meredith, Sage enamoured, ii. Poems 1898, I. 54. Across his path the spouseless Lady cast Her shadow.
2. Characterized by the absence of a spouse.
1812. W. Tennant, Anster F. (1838), I. 15. In spouseless solitude without a mate.
1876. Swinburne, Erechtheus, 583. She besought him by her spouseless fame.
