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What is "bigamy"

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bigamy
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
bigamy
noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Andrew Jackson, the first president from the western frontier, was unjustly accused of bigamy and derided as an unschooled ignoramus.
▪ For the male pied flycatcher, bigamy is obviously a successful strategy, but it also requires quite complex behavioural adaptations.
▪ Green, who has five wives and 30 children, had been charged with four counts of bigamy.
▪ He espoused them both, simultaneously, in a kind of philosophical bigamy.
▪ One of these, Tolson, was a case on bigamy.
▪ Perhaps he was leading a double life-perhaps I should warn Andrea before she found herself committing bigamy.
▪ The male has fulfilled his ambition of bigamy at the expense of a female.
▪ Various new definitions of bigamy have been suggested, including cohabitation for more than six months and a partnership that produces children.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Bigamy

Bigamy \Big"a*my\, n. [OE. bigamie, fr. L. bigamus twice married; bis twice + Gr. ? marriage; prob. akin to Skt. j[=a]mis related, and L. gemini twins, the root meaning to bind, join: cf. F. bigamie. Cf. Digamy.] (Law) The offense of marrying one person when already legally married to another.
--Wharton.

Note: It is not strictly correct to call this offense bigamy: it more properly denominated polygamy, i. e., having a plurality of wives or husbands at once, and in several statutes in the United States the offense is classed under the head of polygamy. In the canon law bigamy was the marrying of two virgins successively, or one after the death of the other, or once marrying a widow. This disqualified a man for orders, and for holding ecclesiastical offices. Shakespeare uses the word in the latter sense.
--Blackstone.
--Bouvier.

Base declension and loathed bigamy.
--Shak.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
bigamy

"state of having two wives or husbands at the same time," mid-13c., from Old French bigamie (13c.), from Church Latin bigamia, from Late Latin bigamus "twice married," a hybrid from bi- "double" (see bi-) + Greek gamos "marrying" (see gamete). The Greek word was digamos "twice married."Bigamie is unkinde ðing, On engleis tale, twie-wifing. [c.1250]In Middle English, also of two successive marriages or marrying a widow.

Wiktionary
bigamy

n. 1 The state of having two (legal or illegal) spouses simultaneously 2 (context ecclesiastical English) A second marriage

WordNet
bigamy

  1. n. having two spouses at the same time

  2. the offense of marrying someone while you have a living spouse from whom no valid divorce has occurred

Wikipedia
Bigamy

In cultures that practice marital monogamy, bigamy is the act of entering into a marriage with one person while still legally married to another. Bigamy is a crime in most western countries, and when it occurs in this context often neither the first nor second spouse is aware of the other. In countries that have bigamy laws, consent from a prior spouse makes no difference to the legality of the second marriage, which is usually considered void.

Bigamy (film)

Bigamy'' (German:Bigamie'') is a 1927 German silent drama film directed by Jaap Speyer and starring Heinrich George, Maria Jacobini and Anita Dorris.

Usage examples of "bigamy".

He was 28 years old, left-handed, bilingual, Catholic, twice married but never in the Church, and was currently being sued for bigamy by one Juanita Torres Fuentes in San Diego.

She had often heard of bigamy, and that her husband should prove to be a bigamist did not throw her into a swoon.

She never thought of bigamy as a crime, nor did it occur to her to run out and drown herself for shame because she was not properly married to Priam!

If anybody tries to prosecute Pat for bigamy at this late date, at least one of them will probably spill the beans.

If someone charged her with bigamy, he added, he would spring her from jail and elope somewhere that was out of the local jurisdiction.

I could assign one of my students to write an article about the distinction between bigamy as a condition and bigamy as a crime and send it to the newspapers.

Jeremiah Gold could talk about long-standing acquaintance all he pleased, but the fact remained that she was a married woman, and whether or not her husband wanted her, she was committing bigamy by allowing herself to be married a second time.

As an illustration of this statement I would take the offence of bigamy, where in the one case the convicted person would deserve a severe sentence of imprisonment, while in another case he or she might be set at liberty without any punishment at all.

This was Elizabeth Chudleigh, the sparkling vivacious maid-of-honour who had befriended George when Prince of Wales, who had learned the secret of Hannah Light foot, who had used it to blackmail the Princess Dowager and Lord Bute and now faced a charge of bigamy.

But it was not the bigamy that distressed him, for many traders had an Indian wife on the prairies to complement the white one back in Saint Louis, but rather the harsh misuse of a young girl.

This is all and some, he held virginity More profit than wedding in frailty: (*Frailty clepe I, but if* that he and she *frailty I call it, Would lead their lives all in chastity), unless* I grant it well, I have of none envy Who maidenhead prefer to bigamy.

I passed him the second copy of the notes I'd typed and included a quick account of my conversation with Adrianne, plus the gossip I'd picked up from Betty Puckett regarding Wilbur Sanders's decampment and his subsequent bigamy.

I passed him the second copy of the notes I’d typed and included a quick account of my conversation with Adrianne, plus the gossip I’d picked up from Betty Puckett regarding Wilbur Sanders’s decampment and his subsequent bigamy.

I directed myself to Stephen Freeburg, who had the same kind of dark, sharp features as Rudolph Valentino, who last I heard had gone to prison for bigamy.