ménage à quatren.
/ˌmeɪnɑːʒ ɑː ˈkatrə/, /ˌmɛnɑːʒ ɑː ˈkatrə/, /məˌnɑːʒ ɑː ˈkatrə/, U.S. /meɪˈnɑʒ ə ˈkɑtrə/, /məˈnɑʒ ə ˈkɑtrə/ A relationship or domestic arrangement in the style of a ménage à trois, but involving four people. Also in extended use.
ΚΠ
1958 Oakland (Calif.) Tribune 9 May 33/3 He sees fair game in all three of his hostesses, even believes he can persuade them to go for a menage-a-quatre. But that's where this human rooster makes a mistake.
1979 Washington Post 22 July d5/2 Sheik Yamani, who after all went to the Harvard Business School and so can talk on equal terms with Chairman Garvin and the other three companies in the menage a quatre enjoying Saudi oil, will get the point.
1982 J. Epstein Plausible Prejudices (1985) 130 The 158-Pound Marriage is Irving's best-formed novel. Its subject is wife and husband swapping, with an occasional bout of ménage à quatre.
1994 T. P. Lowry Stories Soldiers wouldn't Tell xi. 117 Was this a frontier ménage à quatre or an economic necessity—or nothing at all?
This is a new entry (OED Third Edition, September 2001; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1958