Maypole

Definitions

1. A surname.
2. A pole, garlanded with streamers held by people who dance around it to celebrate May Day.
3. A place in England:
4. A settlement on St Mary's, Isles of Scilly, off the coast of Cornwall (OS grid ref SV9211).
5. A very tall girl or young lady.
   idiomatic
6. A settlement near the village of Chelsfield, borough of Bromley, Greater London (OS grid ref TQ4963).
7. A maypole-like structure of sticks placed about a sapling in the bowers of certain species of bowerbird.
8. A village in Dartford borough, Kent (OS grid ref TQ5173).
9. A penis, especially a large one.
   euphemistic
10. A settlement in Hoath parish, Canterbury district, Kent (OS grid ref TR2064).
11. A settlement in Whitecastle community, Monmouthshire, Wales (OS grid ref SO4716).

Equivalents

8 more languages

Bosanskimajmajka

Češtinamájmájemájka

Suomijuhannussalko

Hrvatskimajmajka

Nederlandsmeiboom

PolskigaikMaik

Српскиmajmajka

Svenskamajstångmidsommarstång

Examples

“How would you like⟳ the maypole decorated?”

“The maypole, the focal point⟳ of many traditional spring⟳ games and festivities, is believed to be a relic of ancient phallic worship⟳.”

“At Ickwell Green, in Bedfordshire, there is a permanent maypole. There, the May Queen is accompanied by moggies (raggedly dressed women) carrying besoms - birch-twig brooms.”

“The male Golden Bowerbird is a beautiful bird that builds one of the greatest structures in the natural world, a maypole up to three metres tall constructed of sticks and festooned with decorative clusters of flowers and lichens.”

“and now, disengag'd from the shirt, I saw⟳, with wonder⟳ and surprise⟳, what? not the play-thing of a boy, not the weapon of a man, but a maypole of so enormous a standard, that had proportions been observ'd, it must have⟳ belong'd to a young giant.”

Fanny Hill

CEFR level