v. [f. L. fēmin-a + -IZE. Cf. Fr. féminiser.] a. trans. To make feminine or womanish; to give a feminine cast to (a description). b. intr. To become or grow feminine.
1652, 1653. [see FEMINIZED].
1776. ‘Courtney Melmoth’ [S. T. Pratt], Pupil of Pleasure, II. 98. It only served the more to feminize … and to recommend her to the spectator as a more pathetic, interesting figure.
1790. Mrs. A. M. Johnson, Monmouth, I. 175. Let not an idea of her feminize a soul that should now burn but for glory and a crown.
1841. J. T. Hewlett, The Parish Clerk, III. 81. Feminize this description, reader, and you see Harriette.
1866. Ch. Times, 6 Jan., 2/3. Any more than a boy is feminized by learning music.
1892. The Nation (N.Y.), 21 July, XLV. 45/2. Fénelon, as is well known, undertook the education of the Duc de Bourgogne; he turned a violent, haughty, irritable, overbearing young prince into the mildest, most docile and obedient of men. But may it not be said that he feminized him too much—more than he himself wanted at first?
b. 1852. Blackw. Mag., LXXI. 85/1. The women do rate the men soundly—they would make those present look very small indeed, but that they are feminising, and, under that delusion, know not exactly their own state.
Hence Feminized ppl. a., Feminizing vbl. sb.
1652. Wright, trans. Camus’ Nature’s Paradox, 113. Her vigorous exertion made them incline to the thought of her beeing a Male Feminiz’d.
1653. H. More, Conject. Cabbal., 45. The Serpent said to the feminized Adam.
1867. Ch. Times, 6 July, 236/4. The feminizing of the clerical mind is one of … many … evils.
1890. C. D. Warner, in Harper’s Mag., LXXXI., July, 320/1. Her husband, if he has become sufficiently reformed and feminized, may go to the House.
