Dictionaries › English

madam

Pronunciation: /ˈmædəm/

The English word “madam” has 7 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. A polite form of address for a woman or lady.
  2. The mistress of a household.
  3. A conceited or quarrelsome girl.
  4. A woman who runs a brothel, particularly one that specializes in finding prostitutes for rich and important clients.
  5. A hated or contemptuous woman; used as a general term of abuse

verb

  1. To address as "madam".
  2. To be a madam; to run (a brothel).

Etymology

From Middle English madame, from Old French madame, from ma (“my”) + dame (“lady”), from post-classical Latin mea domina. Doublet of Madonna.

Keep exploring: in the interactive dictionary every word of a definition is a link. Open “madam” there

More English words

About this dictionary

The English dictionary on Glottosphere has 650,529 entries with a page. Browse the English dictionary.

Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.