green gown

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green gown (plural green gowns)

1. (archaic, historical) A dress that has been stained green from rolling in the grass; generally with allusion to sexual activity, especially a woman's loss of virginity. [from 16th c.]
   • 1604 or 1605 (date written), Thomas Dekker, The Second Part of The Honest Whore, […], London: […] Elizabeth All-de, for Nathaniel Butter, published 1630, →OCLC, Act I, signature A2, recto:

     Oh, a morning to tempt Ioue frõ his Ningle Ganimed, vvhich is but to giue Dary VVenches greene govvnes as they are going a milking; […]

   • 1621, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy, […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and Iames Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition 3, section 2, member 2, subsection 4:

     Sometimes they lie open and are most tractable and coming, apt, yielding, and willing to embrace, to take a green gown, with that shepherdess in Theocritus, Idyll. 27, to let their coats, etc. […]

   • 1723, Charles Walker, Memoirs of Sally Salisbury, section II:

     Who first gave our SALLY a Green-Gown is uncertain, but it is reported by many […] that upon being admitted an Honorary Member of Mrs. Wisebourn's Academy, she was, (tho' very indifferently) arrayed in that Colour […]

   • 1814, Frances Burney, The Wanderer, section III.4:

     The boy […] flung himself upon Juliet, with all his force; protesting that he would give her a green gown.