Childbed

The state of a woman in labor. Child'-birth, n. The act of bringing forth a child; parturition; travail; labor. "In the whole sex of women, God hath decreed the sharpest pains of child-birth." - Jeremy Taylor. Childe, ( child ,) n. Formerly a noble youth;-a cognomen prefixed to the family name by the eldest son; as, Childe Harold. "The Childe departed from his father's hall." - Byron. Chil'debert, the name of three kings of France. - C. I., one of the sons of Clovis I., obtained at his father's death the central part of the divided territory, with Paris for his capital; D. 558.-C. II., son of Sigebert of Austrasia and grandson of Clothaire II., was a child when his father was a a inated by the partisans of Fredegonde, in 575; D. 596. - C. III., son of Theodore III, king of Neustria, succeeded his brother Clovis III. in 695, reigned nominally under Pepin de Heristal, mayor of the palace, who was the real monarch; D. 711. Chil'deric, the name of three kings of France. - C. I., son of Merovée or Merovig, who gave his name to the Me roving i an dynasty, succeeded his father in 458, and was the father of the celebrated Clovis I.; D. 481. - C. II., son of Clovis II., reigned at first in Austrasia from 656; and afterwards in Neustria, after the death of his brother Clothaire III., in 670; D. 673.-C. III., the last of the degenerate Me roving i ans, was placed on the throne in 742 by Carlo man and Pepin, the sons of Charles Martel, and consigned to a monastery in 752, when Pepin the Short a umed the title as well as the authority of king. child, ma , and day . The pl. of A.S. cild is sometimes cildru.] ( Eccl .) An anniversary of the Roman Catholic Church, held on the 28th Dec., in commemoration of the children of Bethlehem slain by Herod. - C. is also a holiday of the Church of England.