wench

noun

1. (archaic, dialectal, humorous, offensive, possibly)A girl or young woman, especially a buxom or lively one.

   “Jane played the role of a wench in an Elizabethan comedy.”

   “I, like a tẽder harted vvench, ſkriked out for feare of the divell.”

   “hee weepes like a wench that had ſhed her / milke, he hath confeſt himſelfe to Morgan, whom hee ſuppoſes to be a Friar, [...]”

   “Now Jonathan and Ahimaaz ſtayed by En-rogel: (for they might not be ſeene to come into the citie) and a wench went and told them: and they went, and tolde king Dauid.”

   “Beside, this I affirm—afford / Impression of it in thy soul—I will not use my sword / On thee or any for a wench, unjustly though thou tak'st / The thing thou gav'st; […]”

2. (archaic, dialectal, humorous, offensive, possibly, specifically)A girl or young woman, especially a buxom or lively one.

   “The woman is a brazen, hard-looking wench, a female pedlar, who hawks needles, thread, cheap looking-glasses, pious pictures, almanacs, hair-pins, ballads, of the most humble pattern, through the country.”

3. (archaic, dialectal)Used as a term of endearment for a female person, especially a wife, daughter, or girlfriend: darling, sweetheart.

   “When I am dead, good Wench, / Let me be vs'd with Honor; ſtrew me ouer / With Maiden Flowers, that all the world may know / I was a chaſte Wife, to my Graue: [...]”

   “The mother held her tight, / Saying hard between her teeth—'Why wench, why wench, / The squire speaks to you now—the squire's too good; / He means to set you up, and comfort us. / Be mannerly at least.'”

4. (archaic)A woman servant; a maidservant.

   “When they had kyndled a fyre in the myddes of the palys / and were sett doune to gedder / Peter alsoo sate doune amonge them. And won off the wenches / as he sate / beholde him by the light and sett goode eyesight on him / and sayde: This same was also with hym. Then he denyed hym sayinge: Woman I knowe hym nott.”

   “"I fear there is a chase; I think I hear three or four galloping together; I am sure I hear more horses than one." / "Pooh, pooh, it is the wench of the house that is clattering to the well in her pattens; […]."”

   “[W]orking for Colonel Boone a the time—and two more men whose names I disremember now, and a nigger wench we had for a cook. […] So I got onto one of the ponies and led the others down to the spring near camp to water them while the wench was a getting breakfast, and some o' the rest o' the outfit was a fixin the saddles and greasing the wagon.”

5. (archaic)A promiscuous woman; a mistress (“other woman in an extramarital relationship”).

   “2 [Friar Bernardine]. Thou haſt committed— / Bar[abas]. Fornication? but that was in another Country; And beſides, the Wench is dead.”

   “Whilſt Men have theſe Ambitious Fancies, / And wanton Wenches read Romances, / Our Sex will—What? out with it: Lye: / And Theirs in equal Strains reply.”

   “It must not thought a digression from my intended speculation, to talk of bawds in a discourse upon wenches; for a woman of the town is not thoroughly and properly such, without having gone through the education of one of these houses.”

6. (archaic)A prostitute.
7. (US, archaic, historical)A black woman (of any age), especially if in a condition of servitude.

   “Nancy Basset, 28, likely wench, mulatto / Proved to be free. / Certified free as per General Birch Certificate. / / Patience Jackson, 23, very likely wench, mulatto / Says she was born free Rhode Island. / Certified free as per General Birch Certificate.”

   “Now, I bought a gal once, when I was in the trade,—a tight, likely wench she was, too, and quite considerable smart— [...]”

   “A colored girl […] was fined ten dollars in the Freedman's Court yesterday, for being drunk and disorderly. Not having the money in her possession, she requested that a guard be sent with her to her residence to procure it. The Provost allowed a guard to wait on the wench, who, as soon as she found herself inside of her own door, locked it, and left the poor guard outside without the money. He returned to court without either the wench or fine.”

verb

1. (archaic, humorous, intransitive)To frequent prostitutes; to whore; also, to womanize.

   “This is ſure ſome hide-bound ſtudent, that proportions his expence by his penſion; and wencheth at Tottenham court for ſtewed prunes and cheeſcakes.”

   “He [a man under the influence of the planet Mars] hath a marke or ſcar in his face, is broad-ſhouldered, a ſturdy ſtrong body, being bold and proud, given to mocke, ſcorne, quarrell, drinke, game and wench: which you may eaſily know by the Signe he is in; if in the houſe of ♀ he wencheth, if in ☿s he ſteals, [...]”

   “In ſhort, Ned has drank, wenched, fought, and beggared himſelf, through an exalted ſolicitude for the general emolument, and is now cloſe pent up in one of our priſons, out of a pure and diſintereſted regard for the welfare of ſociety.”

   “I know a clergyman who, having enjoyed for several years the world's good opinion, was turned off, through a ridiculous pique, by a young nobleman to whom he was preceptor. […] He drank, wenched, and was so complete a gambler, that, had he kept his old situation much longer, he would have ruined the principles of his pupil.”

   “This Dalgarno does not drink so much, or swear so much, as his father; but he wenches, Geordie, and he breaks his word and oath baith.”

2. (archaic, intransitive)To act as a wench.

   “λαικάζω (laikázō), to wench”