graft the forked tree

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Verb

graft the forked tree (third-person singular simple present grafts the forked tree, present participle grafting the forked tree, simple past and past participle grafted the forked tree)

1. (obsolete, rare) To have sex.
   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 12, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:

     He would hardly have perswaded Calisthenes to refuse his faire daughter Agarista to Hippoclides, because he had seen him graft the forked tree [translating faire l'arbre fourché] in her upon a table.

   • 1604, John Marston, Parasitaster, act IV:

     ’Fore Venus, Fawn, I have been shaling of peascods; upon four great madonnas have I this afternoon grafted the forked tree.

Synonyms

• discuss Uganda, haul one's ashes, see someone's etchings; see also Thesaurus:copulate