suckle

Etymology

From Middle English sukelen; probably a back-formation of Middle English sukeling (“a suckling; infant”), formally equivalent to suck + -le (frequentative suffix). See suckling.

noun

1. (obsolete) A teat.
   […] the body of this fish [the Mannatee] is commonly 3 yards long and one broad, slow in swimming, wanting fins, in their place ayded with 2 paps which are not only suckles but stilts to creep a shoare upon such time she grazes […] 1638, Thomas Herbert, “Travels begun Anno 1626”, in Some yeares travels into divers parts of Asia and Afrique, London: Jacob Blome and Richard Bishop, Book 1, p. 26
2. An act of suckling
   The baby was having a suckle at its mother's breast.

verb

1. (transitive) To give suck to; to nurse at the breast, udder, or dugs.
2. (intransitive) To nurse; to suck milk from a nursing mother.
   But out of the woman’s great brown breast the milk gushed forth for the child, milk as white as snow, and when the child suckled at one breast it flowed like a fountain from the other, and she let it flow. 1931, Pearl S. Buck, chapter 4, in The Good Earth, New York: Modern Library, published 1944, page 35
3. (transitive) To nurse from (a breast, nursing mother, etc.).
   Buz attempted to suckle his left nipple. 1982, Bernard Malamud, God’s Grace, New York: Avon, published 1983, page 60
   She opened her eyes slightly, like a person drugged—dreamy and quiet. The baby suckled her. 1997, Ridley Pearson, Beyond Recognition, New York: Hyperion, page 129