adv. Forms: 1–2 on bedde, 2–3 o bede, 3 a bedde, 5 a-bed, 7– abed. [A prep.1 of position = OE. on + BED sb. It is only within the last three centuries that the two words have been written as one.]
1. In bed. Somewhat arch.
c. 1000. Ags. Gosp., Luke xvii. 34. On þære nihte beoð tweʓen on bedde.
1205. Layamon, 15706. Ich was on bedde. [later text Ich was abedde.]
1297. R. Glouc., 547. To habbe inome hom vnarmed, & some abedde aslepe.
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. V. 417. And ligge abedde in lenten, and my lemman in myn armes.
1556. Chron. Grey Friars, 20. They came sodeinly to Sandwych in the mornynge, when men wære a bede.
1604. Shaks., Oth., III. i. 33. You haue not bin a-bed then? Ibid. (1605), Macb., II. i. 12. The King’s a bed.
1684. Bunyan, Pilg., II. 77. We need not, when a-bed, lie awake.
1762. Hume, Hist. Eng., IV. lix. 573 (1806). The princess Henrietta was obliged to lie a-bed for want of a fire to warm her.
1876. Smiles, Scotch Naturalist, ii. 30 (ed. 4). The lights were out, and all were thought to be abed.
2. Confined to bed (by illness); laid up.
1660. Pepys, Diary (1879), I. 151. Our wench very lame, abed these two days.
1761. Smollett, Gil Blas, I. I. x. 51 (1802). A violent fit of the gout and rheumatism, that kept him a-bed.
1873. W. H. Dixon, Two Queens, III. XV. ix. 182. Louis being abed with gout, and otherwise broken in his health.
† 3. To bring a-bed: to deliver of a child; gen. in passive, to be brought a-bed, now to bed. Also fig. to deliver one of a subject, draw out. Obs.
1523. Ld. Berners, Froissart, I. cxlvii. 176. The quene was brought a bedde of a fayre lady named Margarete.
1572. Barnabe Googe, Husbandrie (1586), 43 b. The recording hereof is my great joye; for in talking of these matters you bring me a bedde.
1580. North, Plutarch (1676), 34. To go her full time, and to be brought abed in good order.
1610. G. Fletcher, Christ’s Vict., I. 50. Upon her breast Delight doth softly sleep, And of Eternal joy is brought abed.
