I. ˈwüm noun
( -s )
Etymology: Middle English wombe, wambe, wamb, from Old English wamb, womb; akin to Old High German wamba belly, Old Norse vömb belly, womb, Gothic wamba belly
1. obsolete : belly
2.
a. : uterus
transgressors from the womb — William Cowper
the lamb … leaves the womb — New Zealand Journal of Agric.
each adult female fly carries over 50 living larvae in her womb — Farm Management
b. : cradle 1b
from the womb to the tomb
3.
a. : a cavity or space like a womb in containing and enveloping
the soul remembers the primal silence, the womb of Night — C.I.Glicksberg
b. : a place or space where something is generated or produced
the snow … would have been shed off around the sides, and piled down into the glacier wombs — John Muir †1914
c. : a period of gestation : circumstances providing the protection and nurture necessary for birth or early development
the Church, a survival from the dying society, became the womb from which in due course the new one was born — A.J.Toynbee
prepared themselves to leave the womb of government protection — S.T.Kimball
the embryonic State would strangle in its womb — Tom Marvel
II. transitive verb
( -ed/-ing/-s )
: to enclose in or as if in a womb
a new era was born … wombed in war's destruction — Time