v. [f. WOMAN sb. + -IZE.]
1. trans. To make a woman of (a man); gen. to render effeminate, to emasculate.
1593. [see WOMANISH v., quot. a. 1586].
1643. Torshell, Case Consc., 9. Wee may not now suffer the thoughts of safety elsewhere to womanize our spirits.
1647. R. Stapylton, Juvenal, 19, margin. The Roman Sardinapali, men womanized.
1755. Johnson, Womanise, to emasculate; to effeminate; to soften. Proper, but not used.
1782. V. Knox, Ess., No. 156, ¶ 5. To vitiate their morals, to womanize their spirits.
1853. Lytton, in Lett. Robt. 1st Earl Lytton (1906), I. 40. Don’t let Italy womanise you.
1881. Meredith, Tragic Com., I. vii. 146. Men who have the woman in then without being womanized.
† 2. intr. To become womanlike; to behave like a woman, Obs.
1604. Earl Stirling, Crœsus, III. ii. F 3. From the height of Honour to digresse, To womanize with courtly vaine delights.
1613. Wither, Abuses, II. Juvenilia (1633), 232. Such as can So much degenerate themselves from Man, In tyre and gesture both to womanize.
1736. Bailey (fol.).
3. To consort illicitly with women. colloq.
1893. Farmer & Henley, Slang, Goose … to go wenching: to womanize.
1914. C. Mackenzie, Sinister St., III. xii. The Bad Men went up to London and womanized.
Hence Womanized ppl. a., in senses of the verb; also, rendered womanly; Womanizing vbl. sb. and ppl. a.; Womanization; Womanizer, one who goes after or consorts illicitly with women.
1624. Gee, Foot out of Snare, 62. Fit … to act a womanized Chaerea in Terence his Eunuchus.
1633. Drumm. of Hawth., Entert. K. Chas., iv. 31. Gorgeous rayments, womanising toyes.
1634. T. Johnson, Parey’s Chirurg., I. xi. (1678), 17. These are some womanizing or womanish men.
1775. Ash, Womanizing, the act of softening down to the qualities of a woman.
1839. Mrs. Kirkland, New Home, xviii. 121. The womanized tone of the proud and happy mother.
1878. Mary C. Jackson, Chaperon’s Cares, iii. She is a womanized likeness of poor Edward.
1914. A. Harrison, Kaiser’s War, v. 141. The growing softness of life beyond the Fatherland—the world’s general womanization, as they [sc. Germans] called it.
1924. Galsworthy, White Monkey, II. ix. Somehow … I feel he’s a womaniser.
