'Mistress' definitions:
Definition of 'mistress'
From: WordNet
noun
An adulterous woman; a woman who has an ongoing extramarital sexual relationship with a man [syn: mistress, kept woman, fancy woman]
noun
A woman schoolteacher (especially one regarded as strict) [syn: schoolmarm, schoolma'am, schoolmistress, mistress]
noun
A woman master who directs the work of others
Definition of 'Mistress'
From: GCIDE
- Mistress \Mis"tress\, v. i. To wait upon a mistress; to be courting. [Obs.] --Donne. [1913 Webster]
Definition of 'Mistress'
From: GCIDE
- Mistress \Mis"tress\, n. [OE. maistress, OF. maistresse, F. ma[^i]tresse, LL. magistrissa, for L. magistra, fem. of magister. See Master, Mister, and cf. Miss a young woman.]
- 1. A woman having power, authority, or ownership; a woman who exercises authority, is chief, etc.; the female head of a family, a school, etc. [1913 Webster]
- The late queen's gentlewoman! a knight's daughter! To be her mistress' mistress! --Shak. [1913 Webster]
- 2. A woman well skilled in anything, or having the mastery over it. [1913 Webster]
- A letter desires all young wives to make themselves mistresses of Wingate's Arithmetic. --Addison. [1913 Webster]
- 3. A woman regarded with love and devotion; she who has command over one's heart; a beloved object; a sweetheart. [Poetic] --Clarendon. [1913 Webster]
- 4. A woman filling the place, but without the rights, of a wife; a woman having an ongoing usually exclusive sexual relationship with a man, who may provide her with financial support in return; a concubine; a loose woman with whom one consorts habitually; as, both his wife and his mistress attended his funeral. --Spectator. [1913 Webster +PJC]
- 5. A title of courtesy formerly prefixed to the name of a woman, married or unmarried, but now superseded by the contracted forms, Mrs., for a married, and Miss, for an unmarried, woman. [1913 Webster]
- Now Mistress Gilpin (careful soul). --Cowper. [1913 Webster]
- 6. A married woman; a wife. [Scot.] [1913 Webster]
- Several of the neighboring mistresses had assembled to witness the event of this memorable evening. --Sir W. Scott. [1913 Webster]
- 7. The old name of the jack at bowls. --Beau. & Fl. [1913 Webster]
- To be one's own mistress, to be exempt from control by another person. [1913 Webster]
Synonyms of 'Mistress'
From: Moby Thesaurus
Synonyms of 'mistress'
From: Moby Thesaurus
- abbess,
- beneficiary,
- best girl,
- cestui,
- cestui que trust,
- cestui que use,
- chatelaine,
- concubine,
- dame,
- deedholder,
- dowager,
- doxy,
- dream girl,
- duenna,
- Dulcinea,
- educatress,
- feoffee,
- feudatory,
- first lady,
- gill,
- girl,
- girl friend,
- goodwife,
- governess,
- great lady,
- headmistress,
- homemaker,
- householder,
- housewife,
- inamorata,
- instructress,
- jill,
- jo,
- kept mistress,
- kept woman,
- lady,
- lady love,
- laird,
- landlady,
- landlord,
- lass,
- lassie,
- lord,
- lover,
- madam,
- master,
- matriarch,
- matron,
- mesne,
- mesne lord,
- mother superior,
- odalisque,
- old lady,
- owner,
- paramour,
- playmate,
- proprietary,
- proprietor,
- proprietress,
- proprietrix,
- rentier,
- schooldame,
- schoolmarm,
- schoolmistress,
- squire,
- titleholder,
- tutoress,
- unofficial wife,
- woman